


you could make a life outtakes (2019)

by youcouldmakealife



Series: ycmal outtakes [5]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-09-24
Packaged: 2019-10-11 22:46:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 55
Words: 40,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17455724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youcouldmakealife/pseuds/youcouldmakealife
Summary: A collection of snippets originally posted on tumblr based in the general universe presented in you could make a life and its companion series. Canon and AU within, ranging from G-rated gen to explicit.





	1. Vinny/Tony; moral support

Thomas is trying not to dwell on it, but it’s hard not to when you lose after playing your best game of the season. Harder when it extends his personal losing streak — though not the Habs’, thankfully — to four straight.

There were thirty-nine shots on him. Two went in. Neither of them were on a Leafs’ stick last, though of course they got the credit anyway.

The mood is muted in the room after, and Thomas doesn’t think he’s imagining that some of the guys are having a hard time meeting his eye. He knows they feel guilty when their goalie does everything in his power to win the game for them but they still lose, the same way he feels guilty when the Habs can’t make up for a bad night of goaltending. One person can’t win a game by himself, and sometimes, you could play the best game of your life and still lose.

Thomas is trying not to dwell on it, but Anton doesn’t seem to be making a similar effort, and Thomas can just hear what’s going through his head right now, ‘my fault’, over and over. It’s a team sport, yeah, but everyone’s had those nights.

It wasn’t the game-winner that Anton put in: that was a double deflection also off a Habs’ stick, and Thomas knows if it had been Anton’s, he wouldn’t be dwelling as hard on it. The danger of playing defence is that sometimes you’re the one that angles it in, off the stick or the skate or, once, last season, off the face. Poor Depardieu.

The problem is, Thomas is pretty sure, that the first goal was Anton’s stick, but not off the haft of it, or bouncing off the blade, but on a desperation clear after Thomas got the initial save, a clear that shovelled it right into the net that Thomas had left to make that save. It doesn’t make it any more of a goal than the second one, than it would be if it did deflect, but it does make it something Anton’s not going to let go of.

He hasn’t said a word since. Nothing when Thomas tapped his knees with his goal stick in a silent ‘it’s okay, we’ll get it back’, nothing on any of his defensive zone shifts, during any stoppages in play, nothing now. He’s one of the guys not meeting Thomas’ eye, and that better not remain the case, considering Thomas is going home with him. He’d better be. He thinks they both need some moral support right now.

Anton looks up a bit when Thomas nudges his foot on his way to the showers. “Go shower,” Thomas says, not waiting to see if he responds. “You’re my ride.”

Anton’s already showered when Thomas comes out. Thomas bets he was in and out in a minute, had it on cold just to make himself suffer.

Anton still hasn’t said anything by the time they get in the car, just follows Thomas out when Thomas leaves, keeping a weird distance, like he’s not allowed to get within three feet of Thomas or he’ll like, score on him again. The thing is, Anton silent feels a lot like Anton mad at him, and Thomas knows that it’s Anton being mad at himself, but he doesn’t like that either. He doesn’t like Anton mad.

“I did my best,” Thomas says.

Anton’s jaw tightens.

“Some nights just go like that, Tony,” Thomas says.

“We wouldn’t have lost if I didn’t fuck up,” Anton says.

“We might’ve,” Thomas says. “That wasn’t the game-winner. I could have let something else in.”

“You weren’t going to,” Anton says. “You were  _on_.”

“So was Jaworski,” Thomas says. “That’s the thing about goalie battles, you—”

“Fuck,” Anton says, loud enough that Thomas flinches back.

“You want to make sundaes and watch something stupid?” Thomas asks. “We can pile like, five blankets on the bed and be blanket monsters.”

“I lost you the fucking game,” Anton says.

“I do that way more,” Thomas says.

“Vinny,” Anton says.

“I do,” Thomas says. “I’ve kind of learned to deal with it.” It’s still a process, but he’s better at it than Anton, who he often loses  _despite_  of. “And the answer is ice cream,” — just a little, or he’ll get in trouble — “And stupid movies you’ve seen a hundred times, and all the blankets. So we’re doing that.”

Anton frowns as Thomas makes them sundaes — barely even a scoop! — and frowns when Thomas raids the hall closet for blankets, and frowns when Thomas pokes him until he takes his stupid suit off, and pokes him more until he gets under the covers.

“You pick the movie,” Thomas says, offering him the remote.

“I lost you the game,” Anton says instead of taking it, sounding miserable.

“There were seventeen other guys on the ice,” Thomas says. “Vladimir would tell not to be so full of yourself.”

“Vinny,” Anton says.

“I’m not mad but I’m going to be,” Thomas says. “Pick a movie before my ice cream melts. I don’t like it when it’s soup.”

Anton finally takes the remote, and Thomas is pretty sure him picking one of Thomas’ favourites is trying to apologise some more, but — favourite, so he’s not going to say no.

Thomas puts his chin on Anton’s shoulder when he’s finished his ice cream, digs it in. “Stop thinking about it,” he says. “It doesn’t help.”

“Easy for you—” Anton starts, then shuts up, because obviously that’s not true.

“It doesn’t help,” Thomas repeats.

“I know,” Anton says. “I just—”

“Want some moral support?” Thomas asks, and he can see two answers fighting each other, ‘yeah’ and ‘I don’t deserve it’. The second one’s stupid, so Thomas doesn’t wait for an answer, just wraps his arms around him and holds on until Anton relaxes, degree by degree, in his arms.


	2. Mike/Liam HP AU pt 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Follows from [here.](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13403391/chapters/34975451)

“I haven’t been in the closet since I was thirteen,” Fitzgerald whispers.

“Shut up,” Mike says, as low as he can, because whispers goddamn carry, and it is not the fucking time to be making a gay joke, with the situation — the perp being here, but also the fact he’s pressed to Fitzgerald ankle to chest — well, Fitzgerald’s face to his chest, and Mike does not need to hear about Liam fucking Fitzgerald’s sexuality when he could fit a slip of parchment between them.

Not that being gay makes the kid interested. Mike’s got more than a decade on him, and more than his fair share of scars from the way he’s lived those years. Fitzgerald, talented, moderately famous, and frankly fucking good looking enough to get who he wanted even if none of that was the case, is not hitting on him, and Mike’s dick needs to fucking take note of that effective immediately, especially because if if he were, this is emphatically not the time to pay attention to anything but their safety.

Fitzgerald opens his mouth, and Mike finally remembers to cast a silencing spell on the closet, because apparently nothing will keep the kid fucking quiet.

“So no one can hear us?” Fitzgerald asks, too loud.

“Not unless they open the door,” Mike says. And that’s a very big concern right now. The perp doesn’t seem stupid, they’ll case the place before they leave.

“But they can’t hear us,” Fitzgerald says.

“Not unless—” Mike says, about to hammer the point in his dumbass head, maybe underline that this is a serious fucking situation, not a game, when Fitzgerald kisses him.

Mike freezes. In the fight of flight equation, he’s always been fight, not flight, and certainly not fucking _freezing_ , but apparently there’s an exception to that, because he can’t move.

Of course, his body’s moving without his permission a split second later, and it’s not moving away.

Fitzgerald’s hands start sliding under his robes right when Mike hears footsteps again, closer, and he jerks back hard, going for his wand.

“Oh, shit,” Fitzgerald says. “I forgot I had housecleaning today. It’s Thursday, right? They come every other Thursday.”

Mike looks at him, incredulous.

Fitzgerald grins.

“I’m going to fucking murder you before anyone else has a chance to,” Mike says.

Fitzgerald grins wider.

“What a stupid, ridiculous Muggle—” Mike says. “You can’t do a simple fucking cleaning spell yourself?”

“I’m bad at them,” Fitzgerald says. “And I’m away a lot. They don’t last, so every time I came home it just looked crappy again.”

“Fucking—” Mike says, then, “Okay, we’re getting the fuck out of this closet.”

“I mean, we wouldn’t want to scare her, right?” Fitzgerald asks. “Two people tumbling out of the closet when she thought she was alone.”

“No,” Mike says to what Fitzgerald’s clearly insinuating, but he realizes that could be misconstrued as an answer to Fitzgerald’s question when Fitzgerald sinks to his knees.

“There’s someone right outside,” Mike hisses.

“Silencing spell,” Fitzgerald counters.

“They can fail,” Mike says.

“I think you’re probably pretty good with a wand,” Fitzgerald says, which is simultaneously true — Mike does trust his spells — and also  _terrible_ , especially when he punctuates it with a wink.

“She can come in,” Mike starts, overlapping with Fitzgerald’s, “And she doesn’t touch the closets.”

“No,” Mike repeats, but when Fitzgerald says “Take your stupid robes off,” impatient, he finds himself shrugging them off, so honestly, Mike’s a fucking liar.


	3. Matty/Crane (AU); tactility

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An entirely new Matty/Crane AU, because one is not enough.

Elliott Matthews is a tactile person.  

It’s not that Devon’s not like that, it’s well — okay, Devon’s not like that, really. It isn’t that he has a problem being touched, it’s that it needs to be on his terms. But if he does want to have — something — with Elliott Matthews, and he admittedly does, then he needs to get over that. Or, not over it exactly, because Matty’s always respected that he isn’t going to be a go-to for cuddling or rough housing or whatever, but Matty likes to be close with the people he cares about, physically as well as emotionally, and while Devon’s always known that and made an effort to be more physically affectionate with Matty than he is with just about anyone else, it’s probably something that he’d find necessary in a relationship.

There is the additional factor that Devon might lately have the — urge, if he can call it that, to be as close to Matty as he can possibly get himself, but that’s not relevant. Well, it’s somewhat relevant. Relevant inasmuch as what Devon wants coincides with what Matty generally wants, so that’s good. Positive.

This is mostly to explain the fact that currently his body is overlapping Matty’s in at least three places, and it’s — nice. Devon feels warm, and yeah, that’s a physical sensation, because body heat, but it’s also not. It’s also something that has him paying more attention to the slight shift of Matty’s body as he readjusts his arm than the droning of the eleven o’clock news. Bardi’s not back yet, and Devon should go before he comes, because he’ll know something’s up, even if Matty doesn’t seem to, but he gives himself a few more minutes, attention snatched again when Matty yawns, a brush of hot air against Devon’s neck.

Which is again physical, but also not. Devon is attuned to the little things. He has to be, doing what he does. The flick of someone’s eyes from twenty feet out that tells him they’re going to pass instead of shoot, the flex of a hand, the trajectory he can read in a scramble of bodies. This, though, this isn’t something he usually pays attention to, or even should.

The next time Devon glances over, Matty’s eyes are shut, lashes shadowing his cheeks, mouth very slightly ajar. Devon feels the sudden urge to touch, press his thumb against the plush of his bottom lip. He resists it, of course. Untangles himself carefully, so carefully Matty doesn’t wake at all, not when Devon gets out of bed, or turns off the TV, or hits the lights after one last lingering look, presumably not even when he shuts the door gently behind himself.

*

It becomes routine. Routine in that it happens on a regular basis, not routine in the actual feeling of it, because if Devon thought he’d be eventually inured to it, well. He didn’t think that, because he’s not an idiot.

They’re in front of a TV again, because they usually are, something about watching the screen, acting like this is just a way their bodies fell together, accidental, no intent — they’re usually in front of a TV. Sometimes Matty’s fallen asleep on his shoulder on the team plane, but the guys will make fun of him for it, and it isn’t the same.

Things have — escalated, Devon guesses. He doesn’t know if you could call it that, exactly, if cuddling is something that you can say ‘escalates’, but the point is that they’re touching in more places than they’re not, Matty’s leg is over his, and it’s not — this isn’t something Devon’s done with anyone who has hasn’t seen naked before, basically. Well. He  _has_  seen Matty naked, hundreds of times, actually, but that’s not what he meant.

He wants to bury his fingers in Matty’s hair, wants to inch his fingers under the hem of his shirt, splay them out over the hot breadth of his back, wants to press his mouth to the column of his throat, leave wet, stinging kisses pink on his skin, wants to touch him everywhere, skin to skin.

He doesn’t do any of that.

“You comfortable?” Matty asks.

It isn’t the word Devon would use, for more reasons than one. For one, Matty’s elbow is kind of digging into him. For another, Devon is hyper aware of the weight of Matty’s leg slung over his, the slow beat of his heart where his chest is flush to Devon’s back.

“I’m good,” Devon says, which is not what Matty asked, but it’s true. Inadequate as an answer, but true.


	4. Harry/Evan/Roman; be good (pt 1)

Harry has a very hard time saying no to Evan Connelly. He knows it. His whole family probably knows it. The stupid former Rookie Detectives he isn’t banging? They know. Fitzy is downright gleeful with how aware of the fact he is. Roman definitely knows it, though at least he seems to be similarly afflicted.

Evan doesn’t seem to realize he has that kind of power, so every time he asks Harry something, it’s like a genuine question, not like something that’s already established. Harry would literally jump off a bridge if Evan asked, but Evan would only ask for a small bridge with no chance of him getting hurt, because that’s the way he rolls, so as far as people Harry is helpless to say no to, he’s probably the safest.

Tonight, though, tonight Evan clearly has plans, and they’re —

Well. They were fucking Harry plans, but apparently Evan’s feeling creative.

“Think you’d be able to take both of us?” Evan asks, soft. “Let Roman have your mouth so he doesn’t feel left out?”

Between his tone and the words, it comes out seductive as fuck. Harry doesn’t think he’s trying to be, honestly, doesn’t think he ever is, which honestly makes it ten times hotter.

“I can try,” Harry says, voice coming out rough, and Evan’s smile at that makes him drop the ‘try’. He can.

“Good,” Evan says, soft, and then, because he’s physically incapable of not being polite, “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome?” Harry says, a little hysterically, catching the edge of a grin from Roman when he looks over at him, all,  _did our boyfriend just thank me for agreeing to take it from both ends?_

“You’re prepped, right?” Evan asks.

The thing is Evan’s — a lot. Roman’s not small by any means, but Evan’s got a dick as giant as he is, and getting fucked by Evan is kind of, well, an event. It takes a lot of prep — and Evan is, predictably, incredibly conscientious about it — and generally some advance planning. One does not just sit on that dick. In this case it was Harry showering when they got home, working himself open with plenty of lube and then sliding a plug in. He basically feels like that was foreplay in itself, thinking about Evan fucking him the entire time he was doing it, has been ready for what feels like forever, even before Evan dropped a fucking bombshell with that request, but of course, Evan refuses to let him rush things along, Roman, infuriatingly, teaming up with Evan on that.

Well. Harry guesses them teaming up on him is to be expected, considering what’s on the docket for tonight.

Harry’s point is, he probably could have sucked Roman off twice before Evan finally deems him ready, advanced prep or not, but instead Roman just watched, eyes dark, more often on Harry’s mouth than not.

“You’re going to be good for us, eh?” Evan says, soft and fond sounding, so sweet you wouldn’t think he was talking about Harry getting fucking spitroasted. He’s still shy as fuck talking about sex outside the context of Harry’s bed, but once they’re in it, that self-consciousness is gone. Harry doesn’t miss it, but no man should have that much fucking power, pun absolutely intended.

Harry goes red, but finds himself nodding.

“Yeah, you’re going to be good,” Roman says, and this time Harry isn’t nodding at all, bristling instead, but the slow scrape of Roman’s thumb over his bottom lip has him forgetting the retort on his tongue before it leaves his mouth.


	5. Harry/Evan/Roman; be good (pt 2)

Harry tries. He tries really hard, because he said he would, and lives up to what he says he’ll do, especially if it’s something he promises Evan, but he just — Evan’s a lot, and Harry tries to focus, but he can’t. 

It’s kind of mortifying, because Harry has been reliably informed he is good, nay, great at giving head, and the compliment’s only sometimes paired with a ‘it means you shut up for once’ (thanks Roman), but he spends more time sucking in uneven breaths against Roman’s thigh after failed attempts at multi-tasking that it’s pretty clear he can’t manage, and no one’s getting off from a distracted, uneven blowjob that gets interrupted every time Evan fucks in deep.

He expects Roman to goad him, spur him on, but maybe he knows Harry genuinely just — can’t, and that chirping won’t help, because Roman just runs his fingers through Harry’s hair, slides two fingers in his mouth, probably because it’ll hurt less if Harry accidentally nips them.

“Sorry,” Harry mumbles around his fingers.

“S’okay,” Roman says. “Maybe you can take me next, Connie can just sit you down on my cock while you’re still all slick from his come, stretched so wide from him you just sink down on me, leave you filthy after, maybe plug you up so we can take you whenever we want, add to the mess. Just fucking bend you over and slide right in.”

None of that’s going to happen, definitely not tonight, and Evan’s wearing a condom, but just hearing Roman running his mouth, gravel voiced, it gets Harry strung tight, and Evan’s not unaffected, hips snapping forward with force that drives the air out of Harry’s lungs. It’s immediately followed by an apology, because of course it is.

“Just look at you,” Roman says, and it sounds a little mean, a little affectionate. Harry can imagine exactly what he looks like, flushed red and overwhelmed. Roman wraps a hand around his own cock, and Harry looks up, sees Roman’s eyes resting heavy on where Evan’s fucking into him, before they meet his, dark, Roman nudging his fingers deeper into Harry’s mouth, swearing when Harry sucks hard.

“Fucking look at you,” Roman says, pulling his fingers free, and this time it just sounds breathless.

“Tongue out,” Roman says, and Harry doesn’t even think of saying no for once, asking why, just does, and the head of Roman’s cock sits heavy on it, Harry shutting his eyes as Roman jerks himself, coming bitter on his tongue, his lips, over his cheeks and chin, Evan making a sound like Roman just punched him before losing his rhythm entirely, jackrabbiting in Harry before he comes.

There’s this almost — quiet, stillness, nothing Harry can hear but uneven breathing. He swipes his tongue over his bottom lip, bitter with the taste of Roman, bites back a curse when Evan pulls out, a hand running down his back like he’s soothing a horse or something, something that’d be offensive it was literally anyone but Evan doing it.

Harry has almost regained enough coherence to complain that  _someone_ hasn’t come yet before he’s being rolled onto his back, Roman’s mouth hot and tight around him as Evan kisses him — Harry hasn’t opened his eyes, but he knows it’s Roman sucking him off, knows it’s Evan kissing him because Evan kisses sweet — licking the taste of Roman off his tongue.

Harry doesn’t last long, and it feels like it’s ripped out of him, like he’s tender everywhere, the roots of his damn hair to where he’s still wet and open, like Roman could just — Harry needs to not think about that, he’s going to fucking die.

“I’ll get a cloth,” Evan says, and Harry would know it was him wiping him off after, even if he hadn’t said it. Neither of them are rough, both careful, but Evan’s different — more meticulous, maybe, or gentle, not that Roman’s rough, just — it’s weird the things you know about someone without realizing you know them.

“You good, Chalmers?” Roman asks.

Harry grunts.

“Not a word, huh?” Roman asks.

Harry cracks an eye open, shrugs one shoulder, which takes about all of his energy.

“We broke him, Connie,” Roman says, sounding annoyingly proud of himself, and Harry can’t just let that slide, half sitting up, indignant response right on his —

“You did great,” Evan says, hand on his chest, that little smile on his face, and Harry sinks back to the bed, decides it’s not worth the effort.

“Someone needs to get down here,” Harry says, voice coming out all rust, because that’s more dignified than asking for someone to cuddle him, though it’s…basically the same.

Both of them do, sandwiching him between their bodies, overlapping everywhere, which is kind of exactly what Harry wanted.


	6. Chaz/Raf, Bryce/Jared (AU) always a groomsman (Pt...1)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For the prompt: Never a groom, always a groomsman Chaz Rossi is going insane helping with the Marcus/Matheson wedding. Between Jared’s cold feet and Bryce’s transformation into Groomzilla, Chaz hasn’t slept for weeks. When Jared’s Best Man from out-of-town Rafael Sanchez arrives to help with the final preparations, Chaz can’t tell if he’s really that perfect or if it’s just sleep deprivation. Chaz doesn’t care if its a cliche, he’s definitely going to sleep with the wedding party.

The problem with hockey players, Chaz finds, is that they always have their weddings in the offseason. Which makes sense, it’s just — it is really, really hard to plan your training around four freaking weddings, three of which you’re in the wedding party for. Two Flames weddings, two former Hitmen wedding (Bryce and Jared’s does double duty, obviously), and his cousin.

For three of them he’s mostly off the hook — one abroad, and he just has to show up, one in BC, and he just has to be there a few days early for the rehearsal and stuff, cousin’s a bigger deal but he’s not the best man or anything, so it’s all good  — but Bryce and Jared are having it in Calgary, and while Chaz isn’t going to a billion weddings he’s in Calgary training, and it’s —

“Am I making a giant mistake?” Jared says.

“You usually start conversations with hello,” Chaz says. Jared forgets human manners sometimes.

Jared stares at him.

“You’re not making a giant mistake,” Chaz says.

Jared stares more. His eyes are very big. Chaz estimates he’s about thirty seconds away from hysteria.

“You love Bryce,” Chaz says, using the tone of voice he usually uses to soothe agitated cats and dogs.

“I mean, obviously,” Jared says. “But I’m twenty two! I’ve never actually like, been with anyone else! And I’m agreeing to forever!”

“Half of marriages end in divorce?” Chaz says.

Jared starts laughing. It’s better than crying, but not by much. Thirty seconds away from hysteria has become zero seconds away from hysteria.

Chaz pats Jared’s shaking shoulder.

*

“I don’t know why you even came with me if you’re not going to help,” Bryce snaps.

“Dude,” Chaz says. “I just said they’re both nice.”

“Obviously they’re both nice!” Bryce says. “I wouldn’t be asking you to pick one if they weren’t both nice!”

“The uh,” Chaz says. “Ivory one, I guess?”

“It’s eggshell,” Bryce hisses. “God. Like I’d pick ivory. Is that what you think of me?”

It’s a table cloth. It’s a fucking table cloth, and Bryce looks like he’s about to strangle Chaz with it and maybe Jared isn’t crying, but Chaz might be sooner rather than later.

*

With a week to go before the wedding, Chaz is seriously considering faking his own death. The only problem is he’s still under contract with the Flames, and he thinks Bryce might suspect something if he shows up to training camp miraculously alive again. Could be worth it, though. At least Bryce would be married by that point, and Chaz would never have to endure him getting married again.

The problem is, it might work on Bryce, but Chaz has a feeling Jared would see right through a faked death and then hunt him down and drag him back. Not worth it, honestly.

In the meantime, he’s pretty excited for Rafael Sanchez’s arrival in town, if only because that means the terrifying one-two punch of Jared’s nerves and Bryce’s…literally everything will get spread around a bit. Chaz knows their families are enduring this shit too right now, but there is a bro deficit here. He doesn’t know the guy, has never met him anywhere but across the face-off dot, but if he can shoulder some of the burden, he is Chaz’s new best friend.

Chaz gets summoned to the Marcus-Matheson abode (and oh man, Chaz is not saying that out loud, the last thing he needs is a panic about last names getting sparked if it hasn’t already) after Sanchez gets in, and he swears, the air freaking change when he steps in the doorway. The heaviness of it is straight up wafting off Bryce — Jared looks pretty calm, at least compared to lately, presumably due to the guy he’s practically sitting in the lap of.

“Rafael, this is Chaz,” Bryce says, voice tense. Chaz has a feeling that has something to do with the almost lap sitting.

“Raf,” Raf corrects. “Hi.”

Chaz does not say ‘welcome to hell’, because he has some restraint, but it’s close.

“Chaz and I are going shopping,” Bryce says, which is news to Chaz. He wonders what Bryce is going to have a breakdown over now. Candle sticks? Flowers? “Have fun here.”

There is some epic snide in his tone, but Raf appears completely oblivious to it, or at least he’s good at pretending, says “Have fun shopping”, with downright earnestness. Chaz tries not to resent it, barely gets out a wave and a ‘nice to meet you’ before Bryce is dragging him out the door.

“Where’re we going?” Chaz asks.

“Shopping,” Bryce says, still snippy.

“I’m not going shopping with you if you’re gonna be like this the whole time,” Chaz says.

“It’s not like you’re any help anyway,” Bryce says.

“Don’t be a douchebag, Marcus,” Chaz says, and Bryce glares, hard, then slumps a little.

“Jared likes him,” Bryce mutters.

“It’s generally a good thing to like your best man,” Chaz says.

“Yeah, but,” Bryce says. “He’s just — he basically hasn’t left Rafael’s side.”

“I mean, presumably they haven’t seen each other in awhile?” Chaz says. “And they’ve got wedding shit to talk about?”

Bryce huffs. “Yeah, but Jared’s like—  _always with him._ ”

“Didn’t he get here like, literally only a few hours ago?” Chaz asks.

“Still,” Bryce whines.

“Did you flunk kindergarten or something?” Chaz says. “Share your fiance, dude. You’ve kind of got the rest of your life to hang out with him, be a bad thing if he got sick of you already.”

“Jared could never get sick of me,” Bryce says, with the confidence of someone who has not heard Jared’s last three panics about making an epic mistake, and Chaz is absolutely not going to be telling him otherwise. “Now come on.”

“Where are we going?” Chaz says.

“Florist,” Bryce says, and Chaz trudges to the elevator as slow as his feet will take him.

*

They do not have fun shopping, for the record. Chaz would like that to be known.


	7. Morgan/Theo; reinforcements

When it becomes clear that Morgan isn’t going to win Theo Roy over with his wonderful personality, or chocolate bribes, or homework help, he decides to call in reinforcements. By all accounts Theo likes Kai, and Kai likes Theo, and honestly, Morgan’s kind of sick of Kai laughing at his suffering and doubting his accounts, so he invites — okay, drags — Kai back to the Roys with him after a late practice.

Morgan figures it can work out one of two ways: either Theo’s nice to him when Kai’s around and Morgan scores a minor, if somewhat hollow, victory in winning over the Roys, or Theo’s just as rude to him as he always is, and Kai has to admit that Morgan’s not overreacting about how much Theo seems to dislike him.

Neither sounds good, actually, but Morgan’s already invited Kai over, so what can he do?

Theo isn’t home when they get back, which is weird, because he’s usually there in the afternoons, comes right home after school’s out. Morgan guesses his unique brand of charm doesn’t work on his fellow students either.

Morgan feels suddenly guilty. Just because Theo’s a jerk to him doesn’t mean he’s got a right to be just as bitchy in his head. And from the way Kai and Grigory tell it, it’s just Morgan he’s a jerk to anyway. Nice to be special.

Frederick is over the moon that there are enough of them to play two-on-two in the basement, and Kai and Frederick team up on him and Bruno, which is totally unfair, because Bruno ducks out like, two minutes in, bitching about his bad knee, and then it’s just Morgan getting shelled in goal. Kai did not pull that one-timer, and mini stick or not, foam ball or not, it hurt.

Celine pops her head in, narrowly avoiding getting a ball to the face with a pretty impressive duck. Honestly, it looks like she’d be better in net than Morgan. Maybe she’ll let Morgan recruit her.

“Staying for dinner, Kai?” she asks.

“That’d be awesome, Celine,” Kai says, and she smiles and then comes in, ruffles Frederick and Kai’s hair before retreating. Morgan feels kind of jealous watching, his own hair unruffled. It’s stupid, and petty, and Morgan is exactly aware of how stupid and petty it is, especially since he knows Kai was their very first billet, but he can’t help it.

Theo isn’t at dinner, Celine saying something vague about a study date, and Morgan is honestly more disappointed about that than he should be. Like, yeah, Theo’s the whole reason Morgan invited Kai over, but it just feels — wrong, dinner without him. Morgan doesn’t know why — it’s not like he says much, usually, just shovels food in his mouth and exudes an aura of ‘I’m too good for you people, you especially, Non-Roy infiltrator sitting at my table’. 

Kai heads out literally ten minutes before Theo comes in, and it’s kind of ridiculous, but he feels like Theo planned that.

*

Theo isn’t exactly surprised to walk out of school and see Kai waiting in his ridiculous car, but he’s not unsurprised. Kai picked them up from school a lot when he was living with them, and Theo remembers being twelve and thinking it was cool as hell, proudly telling everyone that would listen that was his billet brother. He got a lot of blank looks in return, some ‘was he adopted?’.

“The picking me up in a flashy car is not nearly as cool as you think it is,” Theo says. “Everyone’s going to think you’re some old creeper.”

“I am  _twenty-three,_ ” Kai says, with much offense.

“Creepy for a twenty-three year old to hang around a high school,” Theo says.

“I am your  _brother_ ,” Kai says.

“Billets don’t count,” Theo says, then feels bad when Kai looks genuinely hurt. “I’d go more with cool older cousin.”

“I’ll take that,” Kai says. “Get in, idling’s shit for the environment.”

“I could have plans, you know,” Theo says.

“Do you?” Kai asks.

“No,” Theo reluctantly admits, and gets in the car.

Kai takes him for fries and a milkshake — well, Theo has fries and a milkshake, and Kai sneaks fries off his plate like they don’t count as calories if they’re stolen. Theo’s dad does the exact same thing — whenever anyone has junk food, he’s there, stealing a bite or five.

“Hear you’re being mean to the rookie,” Kai says.

“Seriously, he’s bitching to you about it?” Theo says. That’s kind of pathetic. Theo knows Morgan’s only two years older than him, it’s not like it was when Kai came and Theo thought he was so adult at nineteen, but seriously, you’d think an actual adult wouldn’t give a shit, and definitely wouldn’t go whining to his teammates about it.

“Hurting his feelings, Theo,” Kai says, “I thought better of you.”

“No you didn’t,” Theo says, and scowls when Kai pokes him. “What?”

“Seriously, what do you have against the guy?” Kai asks.

He’s just so fake. And yeah, Theo can just hear Erika tell him that’s not a stone he should be throwing considering he barely even needs glasses, but -.50 is still a minus, Erika, and anyway, he feels like his face looks better with them. 

Theo tells Kai about Morgan’s blatant ‘win over all the Roys’ campaign, and Kai snorts. “Sounds like him,” Kai says, which sounds like support, then, “So you, what, don’t like him because he’s a nice guy who wants to make people happy?”

“It sounds stupid when you say it that way,” Theo mutters. “And he’s not nice. He’s — it’s not  _real_. The whole nice thing is so put on.”

Kai looks at him, not saying anything. It’s annoying.

“What?” Theo says. “Seriously, it’s fake as hell, he’s probably a giant dick under all that.”

“You know Bruno wouldn’t invite someone to live with you guys if he was a dick,” Kai says.

“My dad’s a hockey player,” Theo says. “His threshold of dickish behavior is unusually high.”

Kai snorts. “Okay, fair,” he says. “Celine, then.”

“Married a hockey player,” Theo says. “Again…”

“I really don’t think Morgan would give a fuck, is what I’m saying,” Kai says. They’re far enough from Theo’s school he’s not actually worried about anyone he knows hearing, but he still appreciates Kai not coming out and saying it in public. Hah. Coming out. “If that’s what you’re worried about.”

“I’m not worried about it,” Theo says, because he doesn’t give a shit what Morgan Fraser thinks of him. “And is that based on actual evidence, or—”

“I just have a feeling,” Kai says.

“Oh, a  _feeling_ ,” Theo says. “That’s not vague at all.”

“He’s a good kid, Theo,” Kai says.

“Do I need to mention the hockey player thing again?” Theo says.

“Legit, though,” Kai says. “And you know it. Give me one good reason you don’t like him beyond ‘everyone else does so I’m gonna be contrary’.”

“Fuck off,” Theo mutters.

“Give him a chance,” Kai says. “If only because I’m going to strangle him if he keeps whining about you being mean to him.”

“That’s not really sounding like an incentive,” Theo says.

Kai pouts at him. Literally pouts. Theo can’t believe he ever thought he was an adult.

“Fine,” Theo says, and pretends not to notice when Kai steals a sip of his milkshake.


	8. Susan & Don Matheson, Bryce/Jared; permission

Susan can’t say that when she answered the doorbell, she expected Bryce on her front porch, for obvious reasons.

“Bryce,” she says. “Jared’s in Edmonton.”

She can’t imagine how he doesn’t know that — presumably Jared didn’t leave for prospect’s camp without telling Bryce he was off to Edmonton for a week — but she also can’t think of any other reason he’d be here.

“I know,” Bryce says. “Is Mr. Matheson home too?”

“Yeah,” she says.

“Can I come in?” Bryce asks.

“I—” she says, then, “Sure, of course.”

“What’s up?” she asks, when Bryce comes in, leaving his shoes on the mat.

“Can I talk to both of you?” Bryce asks.

“Do you want to sit in the living room?” Susan asks. “I’ll get Don.”

Erin’s out with a friend, thankfully, because she doesn’t know why Bryce is here, but she assumes it’s not something for her ears, and Erin, just like Jared, has an uncanny ability to overhear the exact things she’s least meant to hear. Susan had that exact talent when she was a kid, so she suspects it’s inherited. And, according to her mom, ‘payback’.

She heads into the backyard to get Don, and he’s as suspicious as she expected.

“Why’s he here?” Don asks.

“I don’t know, you ask him,” Susan says, and internally sighs when that ends up being Don’s first question, thrown like an accusation.

“I um,” Bryce says.

“You um what?” Don says, and she very carefully picks an angle to elbow Don that Bryce won’t see. Don glares, but she’s pretty sure he won’t interrupt again.

“I was —” Bryce says, stopping again, and this time Don says nothing. Good.

“I love your son,” Bryce says, and Susan has a sinking feeling. “I love him, like, a crazy amount, and I — I kind of can’t imagine my life without Jared, like, that’s basically a nightmare to me, and I was wondering if—”

“Absolutely fucking not,” Don says.

“Don,” Susan snaps, and Don gives her an incredulous look, Bryce, a little heartbreakingly, a hopeful one.

“Oh honey, it’s no from me too,” Susan says.

“I—” Bryce says. “I haven’t asked yet.”

“If you can marry Jared?” Susan asks, and Bryce nods, looking small. “He just turned eighteen, Bryce. He’s far too young to be ready for that kind of commitment. And you’re, what, twenty-two?”

“In a few weeks,” Bryce mumbles.

“I’m not saying it’s a no forever,” Susan says. “I’m just saying it’s too early to be considering it. Maybe when you’ve been together for a few more years—”

“I don’t need a few more years,” Bryce says, sounding as small as he looks, and Susan aches for him a little.

“They won’t hurt,” Susan says. “If you’re sure now, you’ll be sure then, especially if you’ve learned what it’s like to live together, and maybe you’ll both be a little more ready. But right now, if you’re asking for our blessing — we can’t give you that, Bryce.”

“Okay,” Bryce mumbles, and Susan wants to give the kid a hug, but she’s a little worried he’ll fall apart if he does, and she has a feeling that’ll stick with him — Jared’s always mortified if anyone sees him upset, and though Bryce is night and day from Jared in most respects, she suspects they’re the same in that way. It’s already hard enough for him.

“I’m sorry,” Susan says. “I know that’s not what you wanted to hear, but it’s the only answer we can give.”

Bryce nods once, twice, a few more times, a nervous tick, clearly. “I should go,” he says, finally, and Susan follows him to the front door.

“Thanks for having me,” Bryce says quietly after he’s got his shoes on, and Susan does give him a hug then.

“He loves you a lot,” she says when she lets go.

Bryce, concerningly, looks exactly like she thought he would — like he’s about two seconds away from bursting into tears, and like he’s going to blame himself for it. She remembers walking in on Jared years ago, maybe eleven years old, sobbing, pounding on his own knee, mumbling ‘stupid, stupid’, more at his own tears than anything else. She remembers the way he fought her when she hugged him, furious with himself, with her, for his perceived weakness. She’d cried herself that night. She’s not sure she won’t tonight.

“I love him too,” Bryce says, and that’s obvious — she doubts he’d be here if he didn’t — but every time he says it there’s such emphasis to it. Susan remembers being this young. Susan doesn’t miss being this young.

Don is still on the couch when Susan comes back into the living room, sporting a scowl, one that deepens when she walks in.

“What,” she says.

“Think you could have been a little stronger on that?” Don asks.

“He’s a kid in love, Don,” Susan says. “I know he’s had his…issues—”

Don snorts.

“He loves Jared,” she says. “You can’t deny that. And Jared is just — completely crazy about him.”

“That’s not enough of a reason to get married,” Don snaps.

“I didn’t say it was,” Susan says. “Obviously I didn’t say that. I told him the same thing as you.”

“You softened it,” Don says.

“I softened it,” she agrees. “Because he’s a kid who mustered up the courage to ask his boyfriend’s parents for permission, and I didn’t want to hurt him.”

Well, he was clearly hurt, but there wasn’t any way to avoid that. She hopes it was a reality check, at least.

“Just wait,” Don says. “Jared’s going to come back in a week with a ring on his finger.”

“Jared isn’t that stupid,” Susan says, but when their anniversary comes up, Jared anxious about getting Bryce the right thing, she worries.

He comes home without a ring, at least.

He moves out weeks later, and Susan wonders if that’s her fault for giving Bryce the idea, or if that’s Bryce’s version of a consolation prize.


	9. Adam/Ulf; humility

They used the word humble for him a lot during his hockey career, but Adam doesn’t think it was the right one. He knew he was good. He knew the things they said about him were true, the good things and the bad things — and they were always quicker with the bad things, for every good thing there were ten bad ones. Every time someone wrote that he was underrated, he had to laugh, because the people saying that were almost always the ones who threw the most bad things his way. 

The bad things, he knew how to deal with. He didn’t like them, but he knew how to deal with them, as long as it was focused on his play, nothing else, which was unfortunately not always true.

The good stuff, that was harder. He never knew how to respond. Thank you isn’t just polite, it’s agreement. Thank you isn’t humble at all, but that’s the word they kept using for him. Adam guesses it was a compliment too.

He hated the attention, the good stuff as well as the bad. If people were talking about him, people were thinking about him, people were  _seeing_  him, and he knew that was the deal, if he wanted to play he had to been seen playing, that people were going to talk about him, talk to him. He knew that was the deal. He hated that that was the deal.

Adam just wanted to play hockey. More than anything else in the world, that’s what he wanted. He doesn’t want it anymore, and he doesn’t know what else there is for him, now that he’s gotten everything he wanted.

They don’t talk much about assistant coaches, don’t talk much to them. It’s such a relief.

*

But he’s still seen.

“You have the darkest eyes I’ve ever seen,” Larsson says, and Adam doesn’t know what to say.

“Thank you?” he lands on finally, the safe answer, and Larsson laughs, low, thumb rubbing over the crest of Adam’s cheek.

“They’re beautiful,” he says, and Adam doesn’t know what to say then either, doesn’t say anything at all, because ‘Yours too’ would sound like he was just returning the compliment, even though it’s true, even though they are. A blue paler than his lashes, a blue that almost isn’t blue.

“You’re beautiful,” Larsson says. He doesn’t have to return that one either. Larsson’s looked in the mirror before: he knows exactly what he looks like.

“Stop,” Adam says, turning his face away, and Larsson’s hand falls, easy, like it was never meant to be there.

“Okay,” he says, then nothing else. Presses his lips to Adam’s hot cheek, which feels like he’s taking something Adam never offered, shouldn’t offer, his jaw, his mouth, which is familiar now, though it shouldn’t be, and it’s easier, like that, easier than talking, though Adam guesses this is a form of communication too, Larsson’s mouth against his, slow, lingering kisses until Adam almost feels drugged with it, woozy. Larsson doesn’t say anything else that night, at least nothing that Adam can’t handle, nothing that Adam can’t take. That’s a relief too.


	10. Riley Lapointes; excavation

Charlie’s easy. Well, that’s not true. Easy is not the first word that would come to mind to describe her, or the tenth, or honestly, one that would ever come up. Charlie relishes being difficult: one guess where she got that from. 

But her interests match what Dan’s were when he was her age. They have the same taste in movies, in books — ‘can you branch out from sports just once?’ Marc asks in despair, but obviously not — and Dan learns the rules of lacrosse, curling, dusts off his baseball mitt in the summers, plays goalie for her in the driveway. That part is easy.

Leon’s not interested in sports, which is fine, but it feels like everything he likes is something that Dan hated when he was a kid. He does his best to encourage it, even though he feels a little out of his depth. Marc is objectively better at anything, well — smart, Dan guesses. He’s not particularly interested in science, but he has a head for it that Dan doesn’t. Hell, Leon has a head for it that Dan doesn’t, which, obviously, but by that Dan means his eight year old is already smarter than him. It’d hurt his ego if he wasn’t so proud.

Leon has collections. Dan had collections too as a kid, but his were hockey cards, hockey figurines. Pucks from every arena he went to. Leon’s collections are a little different. Shells Marc’s parents bring back for him every time they go to Florida. Leaves he carefully presses. Different types of rocks, some he’s ordered, some he’s picked up. Not so much stuff you buy as that you find. 

Living in Montreal makes that a little difficult, so some weekends Dan leaves Marc to shuttle Charlie to whatever sport she’s doing at the moment, takes Leon on day trips, the two of them trailing along the St. Lawrence, do a field trip to an old nickel mine near Sherbrooke that has Leon as excited as Dan’s seen him, filling his arms, sorting through the cache before they leave so they make sure they’re bringing home the best ones. The best ones ends up being basically all of them, and Marc’s visibly amused when Dan comes in the door lugging what feels like ten pounds of rocks that all look the same to him.

When they feel like staying in town, they wander through various parks and keep an eye out for anything that looks different than what Leon already has, though by now it feels like he’s got just about everything.

Eventually Dan starts to pick things up, know how to differentiate by more than colour, quits describing things as, say, ‘that tan scratchy one’ and actually identifying it as sandstone (or, grès) after he consults one of Leon’s million books, knows the main types, some of the subtypes. Dan’s pretty sure proudly telling someone he can tell the difference between igneous and sedimentary rocks at the age of forty-five would get him laughed at, but he is proud. Leon seems proud of him too. He’s a good teacher.

“Nerds,” Marc says with a grin after Dan finishes helping Leon on his geology project — and by help, he means he just helps make the poster look nice, Leon is pretty capable of everything else — and they’ve practiced Leon’s presentation in front of Marc, because obviously he’s the one to go to to double check it sounds right. Dan’s French isn’t there, probably never will be. Leon loudly protests, but Dan takes it as the compliment he knows it is.


	11. Dave, Bryce/Jared; in leave of his senses

Sometimes, Dave thinks Andreas takes too much pleasure in witnessing his pain. Today is one of those days, because Andreas is downright chipper when he pokes his head into Dave’s office and says, “Call from Bryce Marcus.”

“Oh fuck me,” Dave sighs, and Andreas outright smirks. “Can I be away?”

“He said it’s important,” Andreas says.

“Is he calling from jail, you think?” Dave asks.

“Fifty-fifty chance?” Andreas says.

“Put him through,” Dave says, and steels himself before picking up the phone. “Summers.”

“Hi,” Marcus says. He sounds wary. It’s not an auspicious start.

“What did you do this time?” Dave asks.

“Who said I did anything?” Marcus says.

“Experience,” Dave says. “What did you do?”

“I didn’t  _do_  anything,” Marcus protests.

“Why are you calling?” Dave revises. He doesn’t want this to turn into some circular conversation until Marcus finally admits what shit he needs Dave to fix for him this time.

“I’m engaged,” Marcus says.

God fucking dammit, Dave  _knew_  he’d done something stupid.

“To the kid, or did you pick up someone new in the past few months?” Dave asks.

“To Jared, obviously,” Marcus snaps. “And he isn’t a kid.”

“Isn’t he eighteen?” Dave asks.

“He’s nineteen in like, two weeks,” Marcus says, all snotty, like that isn’t a  _yes, Dave, he_ is _eighteen_.

When Dave was eighteen he was doing kegstands at university. Who the fuck gets engaged at eighteen? Neither of them even have the excuse of the small-town high school sweetheart thing either. Though Dave supposes Marcus _is_ Matheson’s high school sweetheart.

Dave hates everything.

“Okay,” he says. “You’re aware that this considerably ups the chances you’re going to be outed without your consent? Because marriage means you’re going to be putting this relationship in writing, and once it’s in writing—”

“I’m not stupid,” Marcus snaps.

“I thought you didn’t want anyone to know,” Dave says. “You didn’t even want my assistant to know.”

“I want to marry him,” Marcus says. “So.”

“If you’re sure about this,” Dave says, giving up on talking him out of it and moving straight into protecting him from the consequences of his actions. “Considering the difference in your salaries, if you aren’t considering a pre-nuptial agreement, you’re—”

“Jared already offered to sign one,” Bryce interrupts. “And he was the one who brought it up, so maybe don’t accuse my fiancé of marrying me for my money, thanks.”

“Well,” Dave says, genuinely surprised.

“I told him we’re not doing that,” Bryce says.

Dave is  _no longer surprised._

“Fuck’s sakes, Marcus, if he’s fine doing it, what’s the problem?” Dave asks. “And please don’t give me some ‘because we’re never going to get divorced’ shit. No one walks into a marriage planning on getting divorced, but somehow it happens all the time anyway.”

“We won’t get divorced,” Bryce says, and before Dave can point out that he is literally just proving Dave’s point, “But if we did, he’s welcome to half of everything, I don’t care.”

“Have some fucking self-preservation, Marcus,” Dave says.

“You don’t get it,” Bryce says. “He doesn’t give a shit about my money, or that I’m a high-profile player — I mean, he does, but it’s not like —”

He doesn’t finish, but Dave gets what he’s saying. He does. Since he was eighteen — since before he was eighteen — most people were probably coming at him with an agenda, and being in the closet probably made it close to impossible to meet someone, let alone someone without an ulterior motive. But you don’t just go marrying the first person who seems to genuinely like you. That’s how you end up divorced at the age of twenty-seven. Not that Dave is speaking from experience or anything.

“I want to marry him,” Marcus says again, and fuck knows if anyone can talk him out of something once he’s decided. Elaine, maybe, but Dave sure as hell can’t, and not for lack of trying.

This is going to end in disaster, but then, it seems like everything to do with Bryce Marcus does.


	12. Rookie Raf (Pt 1)

Adjusting to playing for the Capitals is hard. Raf expected that, going in. There are a lot of things to adjust to: new city, country. New teammates, new coaching staff, new roommate. Newly long distance relationship. Grace is supportive, Grace is great, but it’s different when she’s not right there. Skyping isn’t really the same. New hockey, really. Better hockey. So good he can’t really keep up.

He’s not as good as he was in Lethbridge. Or maybe that’s not true, he knows he wouldn’t have made the team if he wasn’t playing well, especially not this team, a team that keeps getting into the postseason, a team that’s not far from being a legitimate contender. If he wasn’t playing as well as he did in Lethbridge, well, they would have sent him back to Lethbridge. He knows that. He also knows that he’s obviously not going to walk into a solid team in his rookie year and play anything more than bottom six minutes, especially not when you have David Chapman and Oleg Kurmazov on your first line.

He’s not exactly on the Calder short list, heading into November. Hell, he’s not even really in the race. He tries to keep in in perspective: he wasn’t even in the top ten of his draft year, and it’s not just his class that’s fighting it out for the Calder — guys three, four years older than him are in the mix, some with pro experience in the A or Europe. Still, it rankles.

“Don’t stress about it,” Grace says, but she knows it’s out of his control. She’s played hockey as long as he has, though it seemed easy enough for her to drop it for university.

It’s not a fair thought, and he feels bad about it. “I’ll try my best,” Raf says, and Grace snorts, probably because she knows his best isn’t close to good enough.

*

“You remind me of David as a rookie,” Kurmazov says confidentially during a team dinner, and Raf smiles down at his plate, but he knows it’s not really deserved.

“I’m not exactly a Calder contender,” he says.

“Calders favour rookies on bad teams,” Kurmazov says. “If you play twelve minutes, and a rookie on a bad team plays eighteen, who is going to score more?”

“They’re playing harder match-ups,” Raf argues. “Tighter D.”

Kurmazov waves a hand. “Time is opportunity,” he says. “But I don’t mean on the ice.”

“Pardon me?” Raf asks.

“Exactly,” Kurmazov says, and when Raf blinks, “You’re too tense.”

“I’m not tense,” Raf says.

Kurmazov doesn’t say anything.

“I’m not,” Raf says.

“Don’t take this so seriously,” Kurmazov says.

“It is serious,” Raf says. “It’s my career.”

“I’m not saying it isn’t,” Kurmazov says. “You can have a drink once in awhile, Sanchez. Play video games. Unwind. You’re, what, nineteen?”

“And therefore underage in most of the cities we play in,” Raf says.

He fully expects the eye roll he gets for that one. “A Heineken for him,” Kurmazov says when the waiter passes by, and Raf can see the once over he gets. He looks his age, AKA not old enough. He almost hopes he’ll refuse, prove Raf’s point.

The waiter returns with another glass of wine for Kurmazov, a beer for Raf, and Raf dutifully drinks it under Kurmazov’s watchful eye, even though he’d honestly prefer the wine, surpresses an eye roll when Lombardi starts crowing like he’s never seen Raf have a drink before.


	13. Rookie Raf (Pt 2)

David’s probably the smartest hockey player Raf’s ever met. Raf doesn’t necessarily mean like IQ intelligence, though he’s definitely not dumb, it’s that his hockey IQ is insane. He sees things other people doesn’t notice, seems to do things almost instinctively that no amount of training would make Raf capable of doing. 

Raf likes listening to him and Kurmazov before the games, talking about their opponents, and he knows some of it is that they’ve played them before, know from experience what to expect, but Raf still doesn’t know how they can tear apart D-pairs, opposing lines, before they even take the ice. They always have a plan of attack.

He learns a ton just sticking by him. David doesn’t talk that much, especially compared to most of the guys — Raf has always been the same — but when he does talk, especially about hockey, Raf listens hard, tries to suck it up by osmosis. David’s telling him what to expect against the Barons tomorrow when Lombardi drapes himself over David’s back, David cutting himself off and blinking a few times before craning his head to blink at Lombardi specifically.

“You and your padawan are so cute,” Lombardi says.

“Padawan?” David asks.

“Oh shit, do not tell me you haven’t seen Star Wars,” Lombardi says, straightening up.

“I think I did as a kid?” David says.

“And?” Lombardi says.

“And what?” David asks.

“What did you  _think_?” Lombardi asks.

“I don’t really remember,” David says.

Lombardi scowls. “Star Wars marathon, my room, tonight, Chaps.”

“But,” David tries, then seems to give up all at once when Lombardi crosses his arms.

“You’ve seen Star Wars, right?” Lombardi asks Raf, looking suspicious.

“Yeah,” Raf says.

“And?” Lombardi asks.

“I’m not really a big sci-fi fan,” Raf admits.

“Oh, you’re coming too, Sanchez,” Lombardi says.

Raf guesses Star Wars is popular, because the room’s packed when Raf gets there. Well, that or it’s unpopular and Lombardi’s forced everyone who doesn’t know it or like it to come to his room too. Raf skirts the bed where Crane, Whelan, and Matthews are tangled up like a Prairie puzzle, considers the one unoccupied chair, because Lombardi and Chapman are on the other one, and it’d be kind of a tight squeeze. He’s reluctant, because he knows exactly how uncomfortable those chairs are, and if it’s actually a marathon he’s going to kill his back, so he’s relieved when David calls him over, pats the spot beside him.

Raf still isn’t a big sci-fi fan, and that’s even with the modern stuff, with way better special effects, but it’s kind of fun anyway, the Prairie Tangle reciting some lines aloud — so Raf guesses they weren’t forced — Lombardi elbowing David so hard Raf can feel it through him whenever he wants him to pay particular attention to something. Him and David leave after the first two — coach would kill them if they stayed up for longer, though Raf’s pretty sure the rest of the guys are staying up to watch the third, and David walks him back to his room, even though it’s just four doors down.

“What’d you think?” David asks.

Raf shrugs. “Still not really a sci-fi guy.”

David sages with visible relief. “I don’t think I am either,” he says, quiet, like it’s a secret.

“I won’t tell,” Raf says, and grins back at David’s smile.

 _You totally have a hockey crush_ , Jared texts when Raf tells him about the night.

 _Your jealousy is showing,_  Raf texts back, because it totally is, and laughs at Jared’s almost immediate,  _Shut up._


	14. Harry/Roman/Evan, Deb Chalmers; ol’ college try

Annie doesn’t tell anyone in the family about them, which on one hand, Harry explicitly asked her for and appreciates, but on the other hand — telling Sam was awkward, telling his dad was more awkward. His dad told his mom, at least, but that lead to possibly the most awkward call of all time.

No one’s told Deb. Which means, when she comes to watch the playoffs — Kings are out this year, suck it, Kings — Harry’s going to have to tell her himself.

“I’m not telling her for you,” Annie asks when he begs. It’s weird. She’s his littlest sister. She won’t understand.

“She’s twenty one years old, Harold,” Annie says, when he says as much. “She’s not five. I think she’s capable of understanding you have two boyfriends. If Sam can get it, she definitely can get it.”

Sam doesn’t really get it, though, that’s clear enough, though to his dumbass credit, he’s trying.

“Please,” Harry says reluctantly.

“It’s pathetic when you beg,” Annie says, and doesn’t budge even when he offers every single bribe he can think of, because she’s the absolute worst.

*

The day before Deb comes to town, Harry is in full preparation mode. He even practices it with Val, because he looks like the most wide-eyed innocent Harry’s ever met. It’s all a lie — he still can’t believe Val’s had threesomes — but still.

“You have threesomes,” Val says with a frown. “You have threesomes all the time. And I have to know.”

“I don’t tell you about them or anything!” Harry says. Val really pulls off the scandalized maiden look.

“You made me  _see_ ,” Val hisses. It’s been over a literal year and he’s still not over it. Like Harry said, wide-eyed innocent act.

“Can we go back to practicing this, god,” Harry says.

“You’re my big brother and I love and support you,” Val recites when Harry’s finished.

“Aww,” Harry says.

“Where is the pizza you promised me?” Val follows up with, the ruthless scavenger.

*

Harry’s kind of freaking out before he has to pick Deb up from the airport. Roman and Evan practically live at Harry’s now, and even if Deb’s staying at a hotel, she’s going to figure things out sooner rather than later. That or Harry kicks Roman and Evan out, but no way he’s fucking with anyone’s routine during playoffs. Not a chance.

So he’s got the twenty minute drive to work with, because Deb demands to see Beau before Harry drops her off, and Beau is currently accompanied by Roman and Evan, who were smugly lingering over brunch when Harry had to head out. Well, Roman was smug. Harry doesn’t think Evan’s ever been smug in his life.

They’re all of two minutes from his place when Harry finally stutters out that he may have a boyfriend — okay, two boyfriends, and they’re each other’s boyfriends too, and he knows that’s hard to understand, but —

“I’m in college, Harry,” Deb says with an eye roll. “Obviously I know about polyamorous relationships.”

“What does that even mean?” Harry says. “I went to college and I don’t remember having intimate knowledge of like, polyamory or whatever the fuck. Why do you?”

Deb rolls her eyes even harder.

“Deborah what are you doing in college?” Harry says. He is horrified to find he sounds like his mom. Not just the words, either, he thinks she just temporarily possessed him, because his voice went up a whole octave.

“Oh my god, Harry, watch the road!” Deb shrieks just as high.

Harry’s heart has finally started to slow down when they pull into his driveway. There was maybe a close shave with the curb. Not his fault!

“I’m never getting in a car with you again,” Deb says, unbuckling her seatbelt with shaking hands.

“There were extenuating circumstances!” Harry says. She still hasn’t told him what she’s doing in college. He probably doesn’t want to know. Definitely doesn’t want to know. “My um. My boyfriends are here.”

“Cool,” Deb says, almost annoyingly casual about it.

“They’re um,” Harry says. “So for reference Evan’s the giant, and Roman, he’s the one who looks like he can beat you up with his pinkie finger.”

“You’re dating your  _teammates_?” Deb shouts.

So this is going just great.


	15. Chaz/Raf AU (Pt 2)

Rafael Sanchez is Chaz’s new best friend, because Chaz gets a whole day free of drama after he arrives. Okay, most of a day. Seventeen blissful hours without a single frantic text before Jared tells him to come over because someone fucked up the cake and Bryce is freaking out.

Upon arrival, ‘freaking out’ seems like an understatement, but you wouldn’t know from the way Raf is sitting on the couch like, Chaz doesn’t know, Bryce’s tone is normal and not at the level of a shriek. He looks so…chill. But then, Chaz remembers being chill. He was once chill too. He’s a shadow of his former chill self. Chaz should warn the dude if Jared ever leaves his orbit, which is seeming increasingly unlikely.

He gets his chance a few minutes later, when Jared literally drags Bryce by the arm into the kitchen, Bryce glaring at Raf the whole way, like he was the cake fucker-upper. There’s some hissing immediately audible, like they’re having a muted argument. Chaz doesn’t want to know anything about it.

“Get out while you still can,” Chaz says in a loud whisper. “It’s too late for me, but you can still save yourself.”

“I’ll be okay,” Raf says, with this little eye crinkle that’s not quite a smile.

“No seriously,” Chaz says. “They’ve totally gone nuts, you’ve basically walked into a wedding war zone.”

Raf smiles then. It’s a nice smile. It’ll be a shame to see it disappear forever like Chaz’s has. Chaz says as much, and Raf’s smile widens. It’s one of those smiles that’s contagious.

“You’re smiling,” Raf says. “So I think you’re safe.”

“It’s only temporary,” Chaz says, and like he’s summoned trouble, the hissing from the kitchen becomes much louder, before Bryce marches right past them and out the front door with a bang.

“What was that about?” Chaz asks Jared when he comes out, tight lipped.

“Nothing,” Jared snaps.

“Please tell me Bryce didn’t just storm out over a stupid cake,” Chaz says.

Jared does not tell him that.

Smile gone. Forever.

*

Raf doesn’t get any less chill in the following days, which is just — how? He hasn’t strangled Jared or Bryce, and he doesn’t even look like he wants to, when half of Chaz’s daydreams right now are about doing exactly that. The other half of his daydreams involve Jared and Bryce eloping.

“They’re not that bad,” Raf says, when Chaz asks him his secret. Bryce and Jared are arguing in the kitchen again. Chaz has reluctantly developed situational deafness in self-defence. “Well, okay, Bryce is kind of that bad, but Jared’s just stressed.”

“Just stressed?” Chaz asks. “The dude is one day away from snapping and moving to play in the KHL or something to get out of the engagement.”

Raf smiles, and it’s just — really nice to see someone actually smiling. That’s probably why every time he does it hits Chaz right in the stomach. Rarity or some shit. Fuck knows Bryce and Jared aren’t — well, they sometimes are, when they’re not arguing, but it’s just gooey dreamy smiles at each other, and those are gross.

Raf is what Chaz’s nonna would call a ‘nice young man’. He is also maybe what Chaz’s nonna would call a ‘looker’. Chaz has eyes in his head. Still, Chaz is pretty sure his excitement to see Raf every time he does is just because it’s someone who isn’t losing their damn mind over a wedding. Probably.

His smile’s really nice, though. Maybe not just because of the rarity.

“It’s just a few more days,” Raf says, almost peacefully, still smiling, and doesn’t even flinch when it sounds like something shatters in the kitchen.


	16. Raf, Jared/Bryce; apparent

Raf thinks he’s reading it wrong, at first. There’s no way he’s reading it right.

He blinks twice, determinedly.

 _And yeah apparently I’m engaged._  is still his latest text from Jared, following  _Playoffs are the worst I think I’ve been dead for days and no one bothered to let me know._ , which is a pretty relatable feeling. Raf understands that one. The second one, not so much.

He has this sudden, hysterical urge to text back  _To Bryce?!_ , but obviously it’s to Bryce.

 _Apparently?_  he texts instead.

 _Apparently._ , Jared texts back.

Raf doesn’t like phones. He routinely calls his parents and Grace, gets a call from his paternal grandparents once a month, and dutifully picks up when he does, but he doesn’t like phones. Phone conversations are terrible. He hates them. He stares at that one last ‘Apparently’.

“Hi,” Jared says.

“You’re  _engaged_?” Raf asks.

“Apparently,” Jared says.

“How do you apparently get engaged?” Raf says.

“I guess you say yes when your boyfriend gets down on one knee,” Jared asks. “I don’t know, Raf, how do people usually get engaged?”

“Not at nineteen!” Raf says. He’s been with Grace since he was sixteen, and even then, marriage is — marriage is huge. They’re not even close to ready for it, not even at the point of thinking about it. He can’t see how Bryce and Jared are.

At the last big family dinner his cousin kept talking about how all her friends from high school were getting married en masse, and it made her feel old, and young, and mostly messed up. His cousin’s twenty-six. They are nineteen years old. Barely. Raf literally sent Jared a happy birthday text  _this month_.

“I’m not getting married at nineteen,” Jared says. “I mean, probably. We’ll probably wait until I’m twenty. Not this year for sure.”

“Dude,” Raf says.

“I know, right?” Jared says, then laughs a little hysterically. And Raf thought Jared moving in with Bryce before the start of the season was kind of rushing things. This is a whole other thing.

“Are you insane?” Raf asks, before he can help himself.

Jared laughs again, still hysterically. Maybe even more hysterically. “I mean, probably,” he says. “I routinely completely lose my mind around him, so.”

Raf is very aware of that. Raf is probably more aware of that than anyone other than Bryce. He does not have fond memories of Jared’s ‘kill him with kindness’ plan, especially since it frequently involved Raf cringing as Jared forgot the plan and proceeded to literally insult the size of Bryce’s dick.

Raf still has no idea how it took Jared so long to realise he had a crush on the guy. He guesses they’ve made up for lost time, though.

“Dude,” Raf says again. He honestly can’t think of another one.

“I know,” Jared says, not laughing this time.

“Is this like — are you happy about this?” Raf asks.

“Yeah,” Jared says.

“Then congrats,” Raf says.

“Thanks, bud,” Jared says.

“I’m telling the story about camp at your wedding,” Raf says. “‘He’s too close, Raf, he has a whistle, Raf, why is he standing there looking hot, Raf’.”

“That totally didn’t happen,” Jared protests.

“‘He wants to take me on a ride, Raf, what do I do!’”

“Shut up,” Jared says, but he’s laughing. Raf’s definitely telling the story at the wedding. He hates public speaking, but it’d be worth it: other people need to know how much it sucked to be him.

“You’re the worst friend ever,” Jared says, when Raf says as much, but he doesn’t tell Raf he can’t.


	17. Bryce/Jared, Susan, Don; blessing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spoilers for Part 83 of Impaired Judgment

Susan’s not sure what to expect when Bryce asks to speak to them privately. A blessing again, she supposes, and admittedly the situation has changed since he asked for it last summer — Jared’s been living with him since not long after that, they’re still together, which she honestly didn’t expect, and they seem happy, though that’s in a bubble she worries is going to burst if Jared’s living in Bakersfield or Edmonton.

She does know one thing that she can expect, and before Bryce can open his mouth she cuts him off.

“One sec, Bryce?” Susan asks. “Because if I know my kids, they’re probably both eavesdropping right now.”

“I—” Bryce says. “Okay.”

Susan is not wrong. She shoos Erin and Jared out of the kitchen doorway, right into the backyard, and then, because she knows the second she takes her eyes off them they’ll come creeping back, she locks the back door, rolling her eyes at Jared’s injured dignity face. If Bryce wanted him there for the conversation, Bryce wouldn’t have asked to speak to them privately.

Don’s engaged in a one-sided stare off when she gets back, Bryce looking determinedly at a family picture near the TV.

“I put them in the backyard,” Susan says. “What did you want to talk about?”

“If you’re here to ask for a blessing after you already went ahead and got engaged without it,” Don says. “It’s a little late.”

“I — not exactly?” Bryce says. “I just wanted — Jared’s really upset right now, and I think — I don’t want him to feel like he’s letting you down because he’s usually like, the responsible kid, you know? Because I know he does. And he’s — I don’t want to be the reason he feels like he’s letting you down.”

“Bryce,” Susan says.

“I know we’re really young to be getting married,” Bryce says.

“One of you is a lot younger than the other,” Don mutters, and Susan frowns at him. He scowls back, but doesn’t say anything else, at least.

“Jared’s like, the most mature nineteen year old I’ve ever met,” Bryce says. “He was more mature when he was seventeen than most adults I know. And he thinks things through really hard. Like, when have you known him to do something that isn’t responsible?”

Susan glares at Don preemptively this time, and Don remains quiet, thankfully.

“And he wants to marry me,” Bryce says. “Which is just —”

He stops, swallows.

“It’s kind of crazy, because I think he’s basically perfect? And I just — I didn’t know I could love someone like this?” Bryce says. “That it was possible to love someone this much. And I was always — I was so scared of being gay, I hated that part of me, but I can’t hate anything that means I have Jared, you know? Because he’s like, the best thing that’s ever happened to me. And I don’t even know how I got this lucky but I don’t want — I’m greedy, I guess? I want to be that lucky all my life.”

Susan swallows hard.

“And I totally get that you’re not psyched about it,” Bryce says. “Like, I wouldn’t want my kid to be marrying me either.” His laugh is caught somewhere between nervous and self-deprecating. It reminds her of a lot of Jared’s jokes, and she wonders if that’s something he picked up from Jared or something they’ve had in common from the start.

“So I don’t — I’m not asking for your blessing, I already know I don’t — I just,” Bryce says. “It means a lot to Jared, you like, trusting him to make the right decisions. And I know you don’t want him to marry me, I totally get that, but — you can not want him to marry me and still trust that he’s doing the right thing for him, you know?

“And I really — I’m going to do my best to make sure that I am? Because that’s like, the least he deserves, because he’s just — he took a chance on me and I know it was totally against his better judgment, he tells me that all the time, but I think — he took a chance on me. And I’m glad he did. And I’m going to make sure it was the right one like, every day, because he deserves that, and he’s — he’s amazing. Like, I know you guys know that, he’s your kid, but—”

Bryce finally seems to run out of steam. It simultaneously seems like he rehearsed this and like he just decided to blurt out how he felt, and either way, Susan can barely see him right now through her blurred eyes. She blinks hard, twice.

“Don, can you let the kids back in?” she asks.

Don doesn’t move.

“Please?” she says.

“Fine,” he says, giving her a suspicious look, which honestly is deserved, considering.

“If you re-use some of that for your vows, I promise we won’t tell Jared,” Susan says as soon as he leaves the room.

“He’d never forgive me if I made him cry in public,” Bryce says, and for some reason him saying that so fondly, something he’s absolutely right about, Jared would be absolutely livid —

“You have it,” Susan says.

Bryce frowns.

“Our blessing,” Susan says. “Well, I don’t know about Don, he’s — you have mine. Jared is — you have my blessing.”

“Thanks,” Bryce says quietly, looking near tears himself now, and Jared clearly notices when he comes into the living room, giving her a furious look as he goes straight over to him, hand landing on his back. They haven’t touched much in front of her, she realises, but Jared did it instinctively.

Susan clears her throat. “Anyone want a glass of wine? We have that nice one Bryce brought that time.”

“I’m driving,” Bryce says quietly. “But — J?”

Jared continues to glare at her, hand still splayed across Bryce’s back.

“Let’s have a glass of wine,” Susan says. “You can tell me about your wedding plans.”

It’s satisfying to see Jared’s glare change to a look of utter confusion, but even more satisfying than that is seeing the corners of Bryce’s mouth tip up.


	18. Brandon/Milan; resumption

The morning after Milan runs into Nielsen outside his apartment, he finds a letter under his windshield wiper. It’s stupid, but he’s smiling even before he opens it, wondering what Nielsen said to Milligan to get him to start writing again.

Except it isn’t from Milligan: _Brandon’s sad you stopped sending him hate messages!_ it says, the handwriting familiar, the same as in a couple letters he’s received before. If it’s who he thinks it is — and he’s pretty sure it is, because Nielsen seemed aware that Milan knew he was a Flyer, seems to embrace that by identifying Brandon, plus the whole literally being there last night, well. He was right about Nielsen’s messages being the poorly spelled ones.

He doesn’t send a letter when he gets home that night, because he can’t really think of anything that he can send that doesn’t reveal he knows Milligan’s a Flyer, and for some reason he wants to keep that card up his sleeve. Which is also stupid, because for all he knows Milligan already knows that, for all he knows Nielsen told him last night. Still.

The Flyers apparently have a road trip coming up — Milan may have looked it up, sue him — so Milan’s going to have a bit of a break from the constant Flyer incursion. Milan checks the opponents, and chews his lip, considering, when he sees the last game before they get home is in Pittsburgh.

 _Enjoy the Penguins kicking your team’s ass_ , Milan writes, then makes sure the smiley he puts under it looks extra ‘fuck you’, grinning down at it before he goes to slide the note under Milligan’s door.


	19. Bryce/Jared; pick something out

The night Jared’s due home, Bryce pretty much drains his phone battery checking for arrival updates.

He knows Jared will text him when his flight gets in — Jared actually texted him to let him know he would right before takeoff — but he still finds himself back on the arrivals page every ten minutes, trying to see if the flight’s been bumped up, wondering if he should drive out and pick Jared up. Jared said not to, said they’d end up fucking in the parking lot and getting arrested for indecent exposure, and honestly, he’s probably right, but —

Bryce puts his phone down, forces himself to take the longest shower of all time to avoid checking his phone again. He checks it when he comes out. It’s apparently only been nine minutes, which can’t be right. He even exfoliated.

He blow dries his hair on low, which kills a little more time. Lingers in front of the bureau, then the closet, deciding what to wear, knowing that’s probably stupid because it’ll come off in like, five minutes, max. At least it’s a distraction.

Jared texts him two minutes after the site tells Bryce he’s arrived, and Bryce turns on the TV to pass the next twenty minutes, zones out and forgets what he’s watching at least three times. It’s been way too long since he saw Jared, and they talk every day, Skype almost as often, but it’s not the same as touching him, or even just being in the same space, showering in the morning knowing Jared’s still asleep in bed, or making breakfast in the kitchen, or shaving three feet away.

Jared gets like two steps in the door before Bryce makes it from the couch to him, and he’s laughing into Bryce’s mouth when he kisses him, though he doesn’t keep laughing for long, dropping his bag on Bryce’s foot — hurts a bit, but who cares? — so he can tangle his hands in Bryce’s hair.

Jared pulls away right around the moment Bryce is considering how bad he’ll fuck his knees if he drops to the floor right here.

“I smell like plane,” Jared says, letting go of Bryce and taking a step back, then laughing when Bryce tries to reel him back in. “I’ll take a shower, you pick something out?”

‘Pick something out’ meaning from the box in their closet, and Bryce was honestly happy with anything, up to and including just jerking each other off, but that — it’s been awhile, and it’s not something that really translates to Skype sex, unlike jerking off. He’s not going to say no to that.

Bryce grabs the box from the closet when the shower starts up, sits down on the bed with it, already kind of humming with anticipation. There’s stuff in the box that Bryce goes for so often he could find it blind, stuff he’s never touched, doesn’t want to.  Jared bought everything online, some stuff that Bryce had thought of, but couldn’t get the nerve up to buy himself, some stuff he’d never thought of but kind of loves now, a few things that he doesn’t want to touch.

He likes — he doesn’t like hurting. He gets enough of it on the ice, he doesn’t want it in their bed. There’s the different kind of hurt when it’s on the edge of too much, when he has to trust Jared knows his limits better than he knows his own — and he does, he always seems to — but he thinks that’s just an extension of how much he likes Jared telling him what he can and can’t do, whether he can touch or not, see or not, come or not, that he only can if Jared wants him to.

He was worried, when some of the stuff appeared, that Jared wanted that, would be disappointed if Bryce didn’t, resent him for it, but when he cracked and brought it up Jared basically told him he just bought pretty much everything he saw.

“I mean, honestly if I wasn’t up for it I wouldn’t have bought it,” Jared said, but he must have seen the look on Bryce’s face, whatever that look was, because he followed it up with, “But it’s your show. Obviously I don’t want to do anything you don’t want to.”

He must have meant it, because he almost always lets Bryce pick, and when he doesn’t, when he’s the one picking, it’s always something Bryce probably would have picked himself if he did have the choice, never something they haven’t used before.

He likes Jared telling him what to do, but he likes that Jared lets him pick how that happens most of the time. And tonight he needs to just — he needs it to be all Jared’s, he needs to be all Jared’s, leave himself in his hands. It’s maybe stupid to set himself up for being overwhelmed when it’d be so easy to do that right now, definitely stupid not to let him touch Jared when that’s all he’s wanted to do for weeks, when he feels touch starved, but he takes the handcuffs out, the blindfold, hesitates a moment before grabbing the cock ring, because honestly things will barely get started before he goes off without it, and some nights that’s fine, some nights Jared will get him back there, but Bryce doesn’t think he can go that long without cracking and needing to touch Jared, to  _see_  him.

Bryce looks down at them again, second guessing — he always does, a little, wondering if it makes him look like, needy, or selfish, making Jared do all the work, or like, vain, maybe, thinking Jared wants to do this when Bryce can’t even see him, can’t touch him back, worries Jared will think Bryce doesn’t  _want_  to see him, touch him, when that’s like, the least true thing ever. Jared always seems to know what he’s thinking, know what to say, but he isn’t in the room right now.

Except he like, asked. He specifically walked in the door and asked, and honestly if he hadn’t Bryce would probably be blowing him in the hallway right now because honestly fuck his knees, or maybe blowing him in bed, if Jared insisted on Bryce not fucking his knees up. Jared asked, which means he wants it, and — Bryce just wants to give Jared what he wants, always. It’s pretty lucky a lot of the time what Jared wants seems to be giving Bryce what  _he_ wants.

He looks over the options one last time, lip between his teeth, before closing the box, returning it to the closet, and waiting for Jared to come out.


	20. Marc/Dan; routine

The Riley Lapointes are at it again, and by ‘it’, Joseph means he might have to go over in a few minutes and tell Riley to take Marc home before some idiot starts taking pictures. The hockey world is weirdly obsessed with them, and he’s sure it’d end up on a blog or ten. 

The Habs themselves are completely inured to it by this point, and to Riley’s presence after they play the Sens most of the time. Joseph assumes, by Marc’s absence after others, the Senators are used to Marc as well. Honestly, some of the Habs have loudly said they prefer Riley at this point, but if they were trying to rile Marc up, it backfired, because Marc just looked pleased.

“That’s so weird,” one of the latest call-ups says, and Joseph looks over sharply.

Logan looks embarrassed. “I didn’t mean it like that,” he says. “It’s just weird seeing Lapointe, like—”

He gestures at the table in the corner, where Marc looks precariously close to just crawling into Riley’s lap, smiling wider than he does any other time, with the possible exception of goal celebrations. Joseph’s gotten used to it over the years, but there is a noticeable disconnect between Marc Lapointe among teammates or media and Marc Lapointe when his husband’s around, like all his edges have gone soft. They’re even sharper the next day, though. Marc in practice after Riley’s left town or they’ve left Ottawa has pushed at least two rookies to the edge of tears.

Joseph gets it. Well, he doesn’t, because he doesn’t live in a different city than his wife, but he’s had enough of a taste from long road trips to know it sucks. He’s not surprised at all they have trouble being more than an inch away from each other at any moment when they’re in the same city, but there’s a group of people who clearly recognise them — there was literal pointing — and Marc will be an absolute terror in practice if that leads to pictures.

It’s an Anglo table, so when he goes over he lets Marc know in French that he better take his husband home before they hit the internet again, though Marc undermines him entirely by translating it immediately.

“Captain,” Riley says, standing up with a little salute, and Joseph rolls his eyes, hurries Marc along with an ass slap that makes him squeak and gets Riley laughing.


	21. Cap Q, Robbie/Georgie; defence

Georgie Dineen comes to the Caps, and things get fucked.

Dylan can’t say that’s what he expected. Honestly, he was hyped about the acquisition, knew that him and Bardi had played together at BU, kicked ass all over the place. While the one-two combo of Wheels and Bardi on their second pairing is solid defensively — they can be trusted almost implicitly, which is pretty impressive for two guys under twenty-five — well. The Not-Mikes are the only real firepower they have in the D corps, and that needs to change if they’re going to have the depth to run for a Cup.

Time’s ticking, not only because most of the Class of Canadiana are looking at new, bigger contracts — Matty’s especially is going to take a giant bite out of what cap space they have — but, selfishly, because Dylan’s got a ticking clock of his own, body starting to protest shit he wouldn’t have even noticed a year ago, let alone five or ten.

This is far from Dylan’s first rodeo when it comes to team drama, but he can tell, even early on, that it’s going to be a particularly bad case. Dylan’s seen resentment from guys who think they should be slotted where another guy is, simple personality clashes, shit that got said when someone was drunk, or pissed about a bad play, that simmered until it got ugly. He’s literally had to step in just before fists started flying. He’s pretty damn sure he’s never dealt with relationship drama before. Well, not between two teammates, at least — he’s heard plenty of it secondhand with teammates and their girlfriends, wives, but Dylan realises within days that in this case, they’re all stuck right in the middle of it.

He wonders initially if knowing Robbie’s gay is making him imagine something that isn’t there, but after he catches Dineen looking Robbie with an expression that’s unmistakably heartsick, heard a few jabs from Robbie that sound like the kind of shit you say during a break up, when you know someone so well you know exactly how to hurt them most, he’s pretty damn sure he’s not just imagining things.

He takes Robbie aside after Robbie makes it everyone’s business even more, some bullshit about Dineen’s Catholic ass or whateverthefuck that has Dougie scratching the back of his neck awkwardly and Michel looking honestly pissed. Robbie’s defensive as fuck about it, which Dylan was expecting, knew he was going to deal with going in.

“Look,” Dylan says to his sullen ass. “I’m not asking, okay? It’s your business. You’ve got a problem with him, I’m sure there’s a reason for that, and I’m sure it’s a good one. You want to tell me, I’m willing to listen, but I’m not asking, okay?”

Robbie nods, but he’s looking at his feet when he does, and Dylan internally sighs, because he’s pretty sure Robbie’s not going to volunteer a thing, and he’s just as sure that this shit is going to get worse before it gets better.


	22. Morgan/Theo; Nice Guy Thing

So maybe Morgan isn’t actively a dick. It’s possible. Kai spends a lot of time with him, and Kai has good taste in people — obviously, because he likes Theo — and if he says Morgan isn’t a dick, he probably isn’t one.

He’s still an annoying do-gooder, all, ‘I’d  _happily_  do the dishes for you Celine, please take a seat’, and honestly he needs to stop feeding Mathieu because he’s started to expect it, and Theo’s dad needs to stop looking all proud dad at him, he’s already got five kids of his own, and that’s not even including Kai and Grigory, who’re practically family now

But Kai — Kai’s usually right about stuff. Not all stuff, but a lot of it, and it doesn’t actually seem fake, Morgan’s Nice Guy thing. Like, a little fake, but no one who’s secretly a giant dick would be able to be that nice all the time without snapping, and the worst Theo’s seen from him is that he can be a little grumpy in the mornings, which as far as dick moves goes is…barely even a thing. Everyone in their house is kind of a jerk in the morning, with the exception of Frederick, who needs to chill the fuck out.

The fact that Morgan Fraser is genuinely nice may actually make him more annoying. Theo knows that’s like, petty and irrational, but sue him, he’s petty and irrational, he guesses, because there’s something about Morgan that still rubs him the wrong way, starting with the way Theo’s whole family has practically fallen at his feet in a way they didn’t do with Kai or Grigory — at least not that fast — and ending with the way that even when Theo’s being objectively rude to him, he never seems to snap back, just keeps on being…nice.

Theo hates it a little. A lot. It is ruining his life.

“Drama queen, much?” Erika says, when Theo complains over lunch. “Christ, Theo, I’m getting sick of hearing Morgan’s name.”

“Me too,” Theo says.

“Can’t tell by the way it’s always in your mouth,” Erika shoots back, and Theo gives her the finger, resolves not to say anything else.

“But he’s—”

“ _Theo_ ,” Erika says, and Theo frowns, sticks a baby carrot in his mouth and chews it vengefully.

“He’s cute though,” Erika says, looking down at her phone, probably at a picture of Morgan, and she’s apparently too distracted by it to dodge the baby carrot Theo flings at her head.


	23. Mike/Liam; impression

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Massive spoilers for Thrown Off the Ice; best not to read this if you haven't read that. Set post-TOTI.

It’s a long time before Liam goes home. Or, not home, he guesses. Home’s been St. Paul for a long time now, home’s still St. Paul even without the North Stars, without Mike. A long time before he finally gives in to what his parents request every time he talks to them and goes to Halifax. He drives Bella up to Duluth first, Lori taking her in for the week. She says she’d like the company. Liam gets that, honestly. He’s not sure what he would have done if he hadn’t had her, after.

Halifax doesn’t feel like Mike’s the way St. Paul does, Duluth, even Edmonton probably would. It’s not that Mike never came up with Liam, because he did, but he did it for Liam, was never really comfortable there. Always under duress, which Mike would probably describe as his permanent state with Liam, if he was around.

That happens a lot. Liam can still hear him in his head, knows exactly what grumpy, grumbly thing Mike would say if he was there. It’s not like having him there, saying it, but he can’t have that, and it’s kind of comforting, even though it hurts too, not getting to actually hear it, not knowing if he predicted right, or if Mike would have surprised him. He did, sometimes. Not often — Liam knew him about as well as you could know anyone, and Mike was way more predictable than he thought he was — but sometimes.

His parents have a new puppy, squirmy and wiggly and always begging for attention, kind of the opposite of Bella’s chill. Liam knows what Mike would say about that puppy too.

“He’d probably call you Liam Jr,” Liam says, when he takes Iris on her third walk of the day — it’s like the second she gets back she’s ready to go again. “Or Girl Liam. Or Liam Sr, if he was being a big dick.”

Iris inspects a tree, then returns to him with a stick, dropping it in front of his feet like a present and looking super proud of herself. Liam sees Mike’s point, honestly. Not Mike’s point. Mike through Liam’s point.

Iris insists on taking the stick with her, even though it’s way too big.

‘Too easy’, says the Mike in Liam’s head, which is fair, and for once — for once the thought doesn’t hurt at all, just makes him smile.


	24. Continuation of David bottoming (Pt 5)

David’s sure that when Jake insisted on taking things slow, working up to the — the act, that he did so with the intention of easing David into things, making it less of a step. And admittedly that’s true — obviously it’s a little less terrifying when David knows what it feels like with Jake’s fingers inside him, knows he doesn’t hate it, that he very much — he doesn’t hate it.

It just feels like they’re taking things so slowly they’re going to run out of time. Training’s coming up, and Jake’s trained the day after David’s fucked him, Jake’s  _played_  the day after David’s fucked him, so David knows he’s probably being a little paranoid, thinking it needs to happen before that, but — Jake doesn’t seem to be inclined to push things, and usually David would appreciate that, but right now it’s frustrating.

“Can we —” he asks over dinner, and it takes everything in him to say it, more than everything in him to finish the question. “Tonight?” he asks instead, terrified Jake will ask him what he’s saying, what he means.

“You want to?” Jake asks.

That isn’t an easy question to answer either, but one, at least, he can, even though he feels his face burning through the, “Yes.”

“Okay,” Jake says, easy. David hates how easy things are for him, but if they weren’t, well — it has to be easy for someone, or their relationship would probably be doomed to failure. He just wishes it was easy for him too. Maybe it will be, at some point, or at least easier.

There are a lot of things that are easier now than they used to be, this could be another one of those, but it’s still — it’s been years, and he trusts Jake, trusts him not to laugh at him, trusts him to listen, but it never seems to be easy to ask for what he wants, and he knows that’s not fair to Jake, that it’s not fair that Jake has to guess, but — he’s trying.

David showers before bed, a long one, making sure he’s clean everywhere and just — maybe delaying a bit, which he shouldn’t. He’s the one who asked. Except Jake doesn’t seem inclined to go any faster, all slow, easy kisses when David gets into bed, pulling back a little every time David tries to nudge things forward, and David’s faintly furious with him, towel chafing before Jake finally tugs it open, pulls his own shirt over his head.

Everything’s not — familiar, exactly, it’s not something they’ve done enough to be something David would describe as familiar, but the click of the bottle, Jake’s fingers against him, then in him, slick, a stretch. 

He seems to be just — other times, he did it to get David off, knowing that he wasn’t planning on fucking him that night, even when David didn’t, but this time it’s different, like — like a means to an end, maybe, like he doesn’t plan on stopping, and David doesn’t know how he can feel that difference, but he knows, when Jake pulls his fingers out, eyes intent, that the next thing he’s going to do is reach for a condom, and he’s right.

“You sure?” Jake asks, before he tears it open, and David can’t say anything, but he can nod.


	25. David/Jake, wants and needs (6)

David expected it to hurt. He doesn’t know why — the times he practiced in anticipation never did, nor did Jake’s fingers, and he has a hard time imagining Jake being anything but conscientious, even paranoid, about not hurting him. He thought it would hurt anyway. He’s read warnings — sensations of stinging, of burning. He knows what over-extended muscles feel like. He’s very accustomed to hurting, the low grade aches he can ignore, the medium grade that’s harder, but he still attempts to ignore, the worst, the kind you can’t ignore, not if you don’t want to make things worse.

This isn’t like that. Jake goes as slowly as David might have expected, so slowly David wants to tell him to just — get it over with, but he can’t say anything, can’t manage to, breath coming out uneven, almost ragged, nothing in his control, not his breathing, not the way his hand has clenched tight around the sheets without his permission, not Jake, inching into him so, so slow.

Jake stops, pressing kisses to David’s jaw, cheek, and David hates feeling like Jake’s coddling him, but he still leans into it, turns his face towards Jake’s so Jake can kiss him properly.

“You can keep — you can go, um,” David says, when Jake pulls back, a clear question in his eyes. “Deeper, if—”

“I mean,” Jake says. “I kind of can’t?”

“Really?” David asks.

“Wow,” Jake says. “I don’t think my dick has ever had more hurt feelings than it does right now.”

“I didn’t mean it that way,” David says. “I just—”

“You thought it would hurt,” Jake finishes for him.

“Kind of,” David says, because it sounds better than ‘yes’. Discomfort at the very least, and he’s not — comfortable right now, exactly, but that’s not so much physical as how…vulnerable it is, like this, how close Jake is. No closer than when he fucks Jake, but — it’s different. Obviously.

“Do you think you’re hurting me every time you fuck me?” Jake asks.

“No,” David says, “But I—”

“You thought I’d hurt you?” Jake asks, and David knows he isn’t imagining the way Jake sounds hurt right now.

“I know you wouldn’t,” David says. Not intentionally, at least. “It feels okay, right?”

“Are you kidding me?” Jake asks.

“I just—”

“David,” Jake says. “If you want to stop, like, please tell me now, because it’s kind of taking pretty much everything in me not to move right now.”

“Oh,” David says. “Um. No, we don’t have to—”

He doesn’t get a chance to say the word ‘stop’ before Jake’s pulling out, and he’s about to protest, but then — Jake isn’t stopping,  Jake’s just — Jake’s  _moving_ , and it’s immediately overwhelming, enough that he does want to tell him to stop, just — let him adjust to it for a moment, but he thinks if he says that Jake will stop, period, and he’s a little surprised to find that he doesn’t want that, that he very much does not want that.

“God, you’re just—” Jake says, pad of his thumb against David’s bottom lip, and it isn’t until then that David realises his mouth’s open.

He must look like —

He doesn’t want to think about what he looks like, but at the same time he wants Jake to see him like that, he likes that Jake’s looking at him right now, intent, and he’s not sure how to reconcile those feelings, not sure how they can be reconciled, but it’s fine, because Jake doesn’t stop looking at him, and it’s almost as overwhelming as feeling Jake inside him.

“You make me fucking crazy,” Jake says, voice tight, and David knows it’s a compliment, knows that because Jake does too, and even when it’s — even at its worst he wouldn’t trade it for anything. Knows it’s a compliment, and can’t take that too, Jake’s face so open, David so open, but when he closes his eyes he feels it even more, and that’s —

It’s out of his control, out of his hands, Jake’s fingers on his jaw as gentle as the way he’s moving in him, still slow, but inexorable. It must be hard for him to hold back like that; David’s never managed to do that in his life, not when he comes to Jake, and considering Jake’s the sum total of his experience, that’s just — Jake’s patient, and kind, and this is like the embodiment of that, Jake so careful, so slow, even as his uneven breath skates over David’s ear before David turns his head, blind, finds his mouth again, a distracted kiss that’s more sharing breath than anything else.

Jake pulls away after a moment, which David wants to protest, wraps a hand around him, and David almost wants to protest that too, doesn’t want to — he doesn’t know. He lets him, that’s been — that’s been today, David letting him, Jake’s hand tight around him, hard, the way David likes it best, hips stuttering when David gets close, must be — fuck, he must be going tight around him, Jake can probably  _feel_  how close he is, and that’s —

David’s silent when he comes, but that’s only because he’s got his teeth in Jake’s shoulder, Jake laughing breathlessly. David doesn’t know what he’s laughing at, but he — he knows it’s not him, Jake’s laugh caught in his mouth when Jake kisses him.

David wants to ask him to keep going, but he’s not sure he can handle that, positive he can’t say the words right now, so he just fights the disappointment when Jake pulls out, which feels — weird, and wrong, which kind of proves that David wouldn’t have been able to handle it.

“Can I?” Jake says, doesn’t even need to finish the question, because David knows what he’s asking for, nods, and Jake strips off the condom before straddling his hips. Jake likes to leave his mark on him, David’s found, at least as long as it lasts before David goes to clean himself off. It’s objectively gross, he should find it gross, but he doesn’t, Jake’s come hot against his chest, his belly.

Jake nearly faceplants on him before before he rolls off. “Shower?” Jake mumbles against David’s shoulder.

They both should, especially since Jake’s made a complete mess of him. “In a minute,” David says.

“That was okay, right?” Jake asks. “Didn’t hurt?”

David’s pretty sure Jake knows the answers to both those questions, just wants David to say it. “No,” he says. “I mean, it didn’t hurt, I don’t mean it wasn’t—”

“I know, babe,” Jake says, thankfully interrupting him.

“It was okay for you, right?” David asks.

Jake leans up to kiss him, soft, and David knows by now that isn’t him avoiding answering, it’s an answer in itself.


	26. David/Jake; wants and needs (7, I suppose)

Jake knows it’s a cliche or whatever, and that probably everyone thinks this about the person they’re crazy in love with, but David’s the most beautiful person he’s ever seen. In the world, probably, though he knows he’s like, biased. And that’s just — that’s all the time, he’s beautiful when he’s grumpy in the morning, and he’s beautiful when he’s laser focused on the ice, and he’s really,  _really_ beautiful when he’s mad, which is unfortunate, because Jake hates it when he’s mad.

But Jake’s pretty sure he’s never seen David more beautiful than right now, all like — vulnerable, and Jake doesn’t mean that in a creepy way at all, just that David’s letting himself be vulnerable, letting himself trust Jake with something he’s not entirely sure about himself, and that means basically everything to Jake, because he knows how hard that is for David to do, to let himself do.

There’s nerves, not the same as the ones David has, he’s pretty sure, but he doesn’t want this to be bad, he doesn’t want David to regret doing it, or decide he doesn’t like it — if he straight up doesn’t like it, that’s fine, it’s just Jake’s pretty sure, considering how he reacted to the lead up, that he likes it fine — because Jake fucked up and went too fast or accidentally hurt him, or — he’s a little nervous, to start, and David’s  _clearly_ nervous, and Jake’s half worried he’s going to change his mind, call it off, but he keeps saying he’s sure, every time Jake checks with him he says he’s sure, until Jake’s inching into him, as slow as he can make himself, then stopping, waiting for the okay, or the not okay, and also trying to like, collect himself, and that’s really, really hard (hah), when David’s vise grip tight, eyelashes brushing his cheeks, skin hot under Jake’s lips when he can’t resist kissing his jaw, cheek, everywhere he can reach until David turns his face to kiss him properly, and did Jake mention he’s the most beautiful person in the world? Because he is, and the only reason Jake doesn’t blurt that out now, doesn’t blurt that out every single day is because he knows David hates to hear it, somehow doesn’t look in the mirror and see what Jake sees. It’s still hard not to, not to say it now, or just — constantly, and when he pulls back, needing to see him, David’s eyes blink open to look at him, that blue he fell hard for first, so tight around him but just — open, he has to bite down on his tongue to keep it from spilling out of his mouth.


	27. Harry/Roman/Evan; undercover AU

“I’m telling you,” Roman says, for the third time. “This isn’t our guy.”

“And I’m telling you,” Harry says, cranky in his ear. “That the intel on this is sound.”

“He just helped an old lady across the street,” Roman says. “He held the door open for three people in a row. He  _picked up litter_.”

“Picking up litter kind of fits with someone in an environmental terrorist group, Novák,” Harry drawls.

“He looked both ways before he crossed the street!” Roman says. “Like, visibly! Head turning both ways!”

“Well that’s just basic common sense!” Harry counters.

“It’s not our guy,” Roman says. “We’re wasting our time here.”

“It’s my job to be the brain, not yours,” Harry says, and Roman rolls his eyes. “Keep on him.”

“Fine,” Roman says. “You coming to debrief me tonight, hear all about how this guy helped another old lady across the street?”

“I mean, it is my job,” Harry says, bored sounding.

“Okay,” Roman says, looking forward to it, because it’s probably going to be the only interesting thing happening all day. The only suspicious thing about Evan Connelly is how strangely  _pretty_  he is. Not a word you’d usually use for a guy who’s six and a half feet tall, but it fits him.

He doesn’t help another old lady across the street, but he does give money to three separate pan-handlers, before running inside a coffee shop and getting coffee and a sandwich for a fourth.

Roman sighs.

*

“It really isn’t our guy,” Roman says.

“You can’t let me have two minutes of afterglow without going on about this?” Harry asks.

“I mean, the debrief _is_  your job,” Roman says.

“Yeah, but I wanted to get to the literal part of the debrief first,” Harry says.

“You did,” Roman says, leaning over the bed to grab Harry’s boxer briefs — Harry’s eyes linger, because it’s a good view, makes up for so many of Roman’s deficiencies — and throwing them at Harry’s chest.

“Asshole,” Harry says, but pulls them on.

“He’s not our guy,” Roman says, when they’re back to at least semi-dressed.

“Man, I swear I’ve heard this before,” Harry says.

“Because he’s not,” Roman says.

Harry flops back on the bed. “Can you just — stop listening to your stupid gut for one second and follow the intel.”

“Fine,” Roman says.

“Thank you,” Harry says.

“But he’s not,” Roman says, and Harry rolls over to scream into a pillow.

*

“You want me to — seduce an FBI agent,” Evan says, not sure he’s hearing Crane correctly. He can’t be. Crane’s initial advice when Victor discovered the FBI was trailing him was ‘lie low, don’t contact any of us, and act the way you usually do’, which made sense. This — doesn’t.

“Yes,” Crane says.

“Why?” Evan says, then, “I can’t — it doesn’t even matter, because I can’t.”

“Oh, I bet you can,” Crane says. “I’ve seen your glances at tall dark and thuggish.”

Evan colours, grateful Crane can’t see him.

“I’m really not a good actor,” Evan says.

“Just do your innocent thing,” Crane says. “He’ll eat it up. Hell, he already has.”

“What innocent thing?” Evan asks.

“Exactly,” Crane says, bafflingly.

“I’m not going to do this,” Evan says. “I can’t do this.”

“Think about the poor little California condor you find cute for some reason,” Crane says. “Poof, extinct.”

“They  _are_  cute,” Evan protests. “But I can’t—”

*

“I’m so sorry!” Roman hears, right as his coffee lands in his lap. Harry’s going to be furious. Not only because Roman got caught off guard, but because his dick might just be out of commission for a few days.

“It’s okay,” Roman says, through gritted teeth, then looks up — and up — and blinks to see Evan Connelly looking down at him. He’s not even on duty. This is — weird.

“Let me—” Connelly says, napkins out, basically about to pat down Roman’s dick before he colors and hands the napkins over. “I’m so sorry,” he repeats.

“It’s really okay,” Roman says, taking them and gingerly patting himself down.

“I can buy you another coffee?” Connelly says. “I’ll buy you another coffee.”

That is a terrible idea, but then, this has probably blown Roman’s cover — you’re going to remember a dude if you knocked coffee into his lap — so maybe — maybe it’s actually a good one, since Harry’s so insistent that Connelly’s their guy. An in. Beats trailing him, at least.

“Sure,” Roman says. “Thanks.”

Connelly’s smile is — distractingly sweet.

This is — no, Roman changed his mind again, this is a terrible idea. Harry’s going to _kill_ him.

Roman follows Connelly into the Starbucks anyway.


	28. Robbie/Ted, Caps; hidden depths

The first time Ted makes dinner, Robbie decides he’s keeping him.

Well, he’d already been pretty sure he wanted to keep him, but that shit seals the deal.

“What the fuck is this,” Robbie says after a bite, then immediately shovels three more forkfuls in his mouth.

“I’d be worried, but you’re still eating, so,” Ted says, looking amused and like he knows just how fucking good this tastes, even though he hasn’t had a bite himself.

“You just replaced Wheels in my life,” Robbie says. “He’ll be heartbroken.”

“You’re going to finally dump Dougie?” Ted asks, and laughs when Robbie tosses a napkin at him.

“Why are you not a chef or something?” Robbie says, then,  “Are you sure this is in my diet? You didn’t sneak like, heroin or some shit in this?”

“Heroin free,” Ted says. “And yeah, my mom’s been on this healthy eating kick for years, gets me a cookbook every Christmas and then makes me cook for her whenever I’m there.”

Robbie cannot blame her even a little.

“How did you let me cook for you?” Robbie says, kind of mortified in hindsight about Ted’s polite compliments when Robbie made him linguine and clams a few weeks back. Well, he thought they were just normal compliments at the time, and he’d felt fucking fancy about the whole thing, but now he’s got a new perspective, and that perspective is that his pasta was shit compared to this.

“You’re not bad,” Ted says.

“I’m not good either,” Robbie says. “I can just picture you being like ‘well, he tried, that’s sweet’.”

“It  _was_  sweet,” Ted says.

“I am never making food for you again,” Robbie says. “Also I’m considering like, hiring you as my personal chef.”

“I kind of like the boyfriend job, honestly,” Ted says.

“You can keep that job,” Robbie says. “Actually, I demand you keep that job.”

“Oh, you  _demand_ ,” Ted says, but he’s smiling, and Robbie grins back before he fucking demolishes his plate.  
*

“I’ve replaced you with Ted,” Robbie tells Wheels on their flight out to Dallas.

“You’re breaking up with me?” Wheels asks. Everyone thinks they’re so fucking funny.

“He’s like, a super chef,” Robbie says. “And he didn’t tell me. Months I’ve gone without having him cook for me. Months!”

“Does this mean you’ll finally stop inviting yourself over for dinner?” Dougie asks, not looking heartbroken at all.

“I mean, why make the effort for substandard product?” Robbie says, and Dougie gapes at him for a moment before he throws a magazine at his head, Robbie ducking, only for it to hit Chaps, who’s texting — well, two guesses.

Chaps looks over at him, betrayed.

“Dougie threw it,” Robbie says.

“Robbie called my food substandard product!” Wheels says.  _Now_  he looks heartbroken.

“Your food’s not substandard product,” Chaps says solemnly, and it is ridiculous how touched Wheels looks.

*

Robbie heads straight over to Ted’s when they get back to Washington, which he’s finding has become pretty normal. Ted’s come over to his some, but mostly, when Robbie’s in town, he’s sleeping in Ted’s bed more than his own. Moving a little fast, probably, spending practically every night together, but considering the amount of time he’s away, he’s not exactly getting sick of it, and that seems mutual.

“It’s open,” Ted calls when Robbie knocks, and Robbie lets himself in to find Ted in the kitchen. He’s wearing an actual apron. It is both hilarious on a guy his size and kind of cute. Robbie would still chirp the shit out of him for it, but he’s not going to risk not eating dinner. Shit. Ted has a universal trump card on him, and it is called making food better than anyone but Robbie’s mamma.

Well, frankly it’s better than his mamma’s, but he would eat glass before he told her that.

“Hey, can I help?” Robbie asks, nudging his nose against Ted’s shoulder.

“You can pour us some wine,” Ted says. “The Sauvignon blanc will probably pair best.”

“How do you even know that shit?” Robbie asks. “Hidden depths with you.”

“So many,” Ted says agreeably, and Robbie goes to grab the wine from the fridge after departing with a kiss to Ted’s shoulder. It’s a sappy fucking thought, so he’s not going to say it, but he’s pretty glad he gets to keep on discovering them.


	29. David/Jake; appropriate dress

They don’t have an anniversary, exactly. David realises that when he’s getting dressed to go to the party the Lourdes siblings are throwing for their parents’ 40th anniversary. Or, they do, he knows exactly which day they started up again, and Jake treats the All-Star weekend every year like it’s a whole weekend of anniversary, refusing to settle for a single day, whether they’re in it or not — and lately, it’s mostly been not for both of them — and even when their actual anniversary, such as it is, isn’t on that weekend at all. But it isn’t as clear cut as an anniversary of a first date or wedding. If anyone asked what it was an anniversary of, he could hardly say ‘the second time I recklessly kissed him in a hallway’.

“Looking good,” Jake says from the doorway. He’s wearing a nice shirt, one his mom got him for his birthday, if David’s remembering correctly, along with a pair of jeans, and David is suddenly second-guessing his suit.

“Am I overdressed?” David asks.

“Nah,” Jake says.

“If everyone’s going to be dressing like you—” David says.

“They know what you dress like,” Jake says. “You’re good, babe.”

David blinks. “What do I dress like?”

“Stylish,” Jake says, and David snorts, because that isn’t something he’s been accused of before. Kiro threatened to burn his entire closet last year as a way of blackmailing him into buying clothes with ‘colour’, and scoffed when David pointed out multiple coloured shirts before dragging him out and making him buy a dress shirt so green it hurt his eyes. Rather than stylish, Jake probably meant formal, and the Lourdes family is assuredly not formal, in dress or manner.

“Oh, he’s taking off the tie,” Jake says.

David tries to scowl at him, but fails, Jake’s grin contagious, and throws the tie at Jake to cover for the smile he cracked. Jake catches it easily, still smiling, and when David starts unbuttoning his shirt, says, “This is starting to feel like you tapped into my jerk-off material.”

David’s fingers stall.

“Really?” Jake asks hopefully.

“We’re going to be late—” David says.

“Late is like, early for the Lourdes,” Jake says, which is true. They’re always the first ones there. Once they even arrived before the hosts, and were stuck sitting on Allie’s porch for twenty minutes because she was doing a last minute supply run.

David continues unbuttoning his shirt. He does, after all, need to change, and with the Lourdes’ stance on punctuality, they have time.

“Yeah, you fold that shirt for me, baby,” Jake says when David shrugs it off, and laughs, loud and bright, when David throws it at his head, the shirt hitting the floor, probably crumpled past recovery, before Jake reels him in by the belt loops.


	30. Bryce/Jared, Raf/Grace, Chaz/Ashley; interludes

“Don’t do it don’t do it don’t do it,” Chaz chants, then, “Fuck, Grace!”

“No mercy in Mario Kart,” Grace says. “Enjoy last place, Rossi.”

It’s hilarious, because the worst thing about playing Grace was that she wouldn’t even bother to chirp you, like her victory was all but assured and it’s best to just yawn through the process of beating everyone, but either that doesn’t apply to Mario Kart, or university made Grace mean.

It’s less hilarious when Jared eats shell and goes right off the track to a sugary sweet, “Bye, Matheson.”

“Your girlfriend is a demon,” Jared hisses to Raf, who’s only in second place because she loves him or whatever.

“Suck it, Sanchez,” Grace says.

Raf is no longer in second, and he noticeably doesn’t debate Jared about Grace being a demon.

*

“My point,” Ashley says, with a sweeping motion, nearly knocking Grace in the face before Chaz catches her wrist and gently lowers it. She looks down at Chaz’s hand like she’s trying to figure out where it came from. Jared’s been sipping slowly, but he’s still feeling it, and he’s by far the most sober person in the room right now — even Raf’s pretty tipsy, and Grace might actually be asleep. It’s a good thing they have three straight days off, or Arvan would probably smell the fumes on them the second they walked in the door. He might still.

“What was my point?” Ashley asks after a moment.

“The arbitrary segregation of interrelated courses into discrete categories is fucking with your degree?” Grace says without opening her eyes. Jared guesses she’s not asleep, then. Also he feels like the words ‘fucking with’ don’t belong in the same sentence as ‘arbitrary segregation’, but what does he know. Not what’s discreet about any of that.

“Right!” Ashley says.    

“What the fuck are they talking about?” Bryce whispers in Jared’s ear.

Jared honestly tuned out five minutes ago to wonder if Bryce would eventually notice that he was like, sprawled half on Jared and subsequently freak out about it, because while Ashley and Grace are almost certainly aware that Bryce and Jared are together, they haven’t officially been Told. If he _has_ noticed, he hasn’t done anything about it.

“School?” Jared ventures. It sounds like a school thing, and Ashley and Grace both study at University of Alberta, so school makes sense.

“Like, how many different degrees in design can you offer before you’re just making a mockery of specialization!” Ashley says. “And if this is undergrad, what the hell is post-grad like?”

“I’m so confused,” Bryce says softly.

Jared pats his hand, squeezing when he doesn’t pull away.

*

“M’gonna die,” Chaz says, face buried in his couch cushions. It was a particularly tough day of training, but he’s still being a giant baby.

“Can you let us sit down first?” Jared asks.

Chaz kicks his legs up, drops them right back on Jared after he steals the spot. “Get your fat legs off me,” Jared says.

“My legs are fucking chiseled,” Chaz retorts.

Raf, smarter than Jared, drags a kitchen chair in, so he’s not stuck with a lapful of fat ass calves.

“Chiseled!” Chaz protests when Jared says so. “You’re just jealous because you’re bony.”

“I am not bony!” Jared says.

“Poor BJ probably gets bruises,” Chaz says, then, “See?!” when Jared elbows him in the back. “Where’s the muscle?”

“I’ll show you the fucking muscle,” Jared says, and he must take Chaz by surprise, because even though Chaz has at least thirty pounds on him, Jared becomes the king of the couch.

“Ow,” Chaz says mournfully into the carpet, as Raf heartlessly steps over his fallen form.

“Can I sit?” he asks.

“Sure,” Jared generously allows, and swings his feet up to make room.

“A little bony,” Raf says, poking one of Jared’s knees.

“You want me to kick you off this couch too?” Jared asks.

“Try,” Raf says, with this set in his eyes like Grace gets during video games, and Jared is suddenly very certain, despite the fact that him and Raf are a lot closer in size than him and Chaz, he wouldn’t succeed.

“I can’t believe you’re making me lie on the floor in my own house,” Chaz mutters, but Jared doesn’t see him bothering to move.


	31. Tony/Vinny; evident

Joseph isn’t sure when things with Tony and Vinny went from friendship — and about as co-dependent a friendship he’s ever seen, though one that seemed to be good for both of them — to something entirely different, couldn’t pin a date on it, or even swear that it wasn’t that way all along, since they came up to the Habs, though he doesn’t think so, mostly because Anton’s about as obvious a person as you can be, and Tommo isn’t much behind him, there.

It isn’t anything in particular, at first, nothing he could put his finger on, point out as the culprit; they’re hardly in each other’s laps, at least any more than they always have been, as Vinny has been with all of his teammates, sometimes literally. Hell, Vinny’s sat in  _Joseph’s_  lap before. 

Vinny has zero personal space and no shortage of affection, and even the guys who aren’t particularly touchy — and Tony is very much one of them — don’t seem to mind it if it’s Vinny doing the hugging, or clinging, or lap-sitting. Joseph suspects a full half of the team has given him piggy back rides at one point or the other, himself included in that number. He’s unfortunately heavier than he looks.

He thinks maybe the level of co-dependent friendship has just increased, lines that can be blurry smudged over into something that looks more like a relationship than anything else, until he catches Anton just — looking at Tommo as he sleeps on the plane, face wide open, fondness all over it, before tucking the plane blanket tighter around his shoulders, nudging his nose against Vinny’s temple before shutting his eyes, something so practiced about it Joseph’s suddenly positive that when they’re at home, in their own beds, they sleep together, and by together he doesn’t just mean in the same bed, but overlapping, tangled together, touching everywhere.

He has this sudden urge to take Anton aside and tell him to treat Vinny right, but he’s pretty sure he’d need a new D-partner when Anton died of embarrassment, so he probably shouldn’t. Has another urge to take Vinny aside and do the same, but that’s probably unnecessary. If anyone can handle the care and feeding of Anton Petrov, it’s Vinny, and has been for years.

He looks away, feeling like he saw something private, even though Anton’s well aware he’s surrounded by teammates, catches Serge glancing over at them as well.

“That something new, you think?” Serge asks, low.

“Yeah,” Joseph says. “Think so.”

“Well,” Serge says, shuts his own eyes. “About time.”


	32. literally just sex sentences

Mike, edging his pinkie finger into Liam, telling him how good he’s being as Liam tries so hard not to shift beneath him.

Derek, licking over his lips and catching the remnants of Andy’s come, straddling Andy’s hips and jerking off, aiming for his chest, the dark flush of exertion spreading over his pale, pale skin.

David, straddling Jake’s hips, holding him down, because if this happens he needs to be the one in control, and Jake, wide-eyed, stupefied, happy to take anything as long as that means David lowering himself slow, so slow, onto Jake’s cock.

Adam, jerking off, trying his best to keep it neutral, keep the figures dark and shadowed and anonymous, but he comes remembering how tight Larsson was around him when he was on the verge, how welcoming he felt.

Luke, fucking Andreas after the Jets visit, hard, too hard, and Andreas likes it but that barely penetrates, Luke fucks into him and there’s nothing — he can’t pretend, he can’t imagine Andreas as anything but what he is, and Luke loves him, he fucking loves him, but right now he’s so angry at him because there’s no one else to be mad at.

Vinny, laughing a little when Anton rolls off the bed and grumps his way toward the bathroom to jerk off when kissing moved from companionable to sexual to him, trying to stay awake for prime chirping, but falling asleep before Anton returns, waking up to Anton plastered against his back, breathing soft against the nape of his neck.


	33. Robbie/Georgie; daemon au

Deirdre sees Georgie’s hands shake before she reads it, so she already knows, before she looks, that whatever it is he’s reading is from Robbie, and whatever it is Robbie wrote is bad.

“Georgie,” she says quietly.

“It’s nothing,” Georgie says, voice so brittle it’s about to shatter, and doesn’t show her, but she catches a glance after he’s written all over it — it feels like passing notes, some elementary school thing, but she doesn’t think anyone in elementary school’s ever written someone a check for a thousand dollars for not sleeping with them. She doesn’t know how Georgie manages to practice after that. Even sitting on the sidelines feels like too much to her because Luca’s there, and Georgie actually has to do drills with Robbie.

“I’m sorry,” Luca says, soft, and Deirdre knows he had nothing to do with it, probably tried to talk Robbie out of it, but she can’t even look at him right now, not when Georgie’s so hurt she can feel it from across the ice, tangled and ugly.

Georgie takes a long time to get ready after practice, and Deirdre isn’t sure if that’s to make sure Robbie leaves before he does, or because he can’t drive right now. Both, possibly. His phone buzzes when he’s getting his shoes on, and Deirdre can feel him freeze against her, nudges his thigh until he exhales and pulls it out, reading it as she does,  _I’d rather you did it_ , from Robbie, presumably in response to the ‘GO FUCK YOURSELF’ she saw Georgie write on the check.

“Let’s go home,” Deirdre says, half a suggestion, half a plea, though she knows he won’t. “Georgie.”

“Fine,” Georgie says, but halfway home he parks on a side street, texting something back.

“Georgie,” Deirdre says, but he’s not listening, might not even hear her, looking through the windshield and breathing fast through his nose, something close to hyperventilation. He jerks when his phone buzzes, looking down at it, and when he pulls out of the spot, Deirdre knows where they’re going.

“Don’t do this,” Deirdre says, when Georgie pulls into Robbie’s driveway. If his hands weren’t white-knuckling the steering wheel, she thinks they’d be shaking again. She can’t count how many times she’s said that lately, and he never listens, and it hurts, watching a part of her fall apart and not being able to do a thing about this. “Georgie.”

“Are you coming in with me or what?” Georgie asks, like she has any choice, and when he gets out of the car, she follows.


	34. Bryce/Jared; complementary compliments

Sometimes — and Jared knows exactly how dumb this sounds — it’s kind of frustrating when your boyfriend is the nicest person in the world, or, at least the nicest person in the world to Jared.

During one faintly ridiculous weekend, Jared decides to count how many compliments Bryce gives him. Seventeen. Seventeen compliments, ranging from the totally reasonable — Jared is obviously great at nailing his boyfriend, thanks — to the utterly ridiculous. He compliments Jared’s _eyebrows_. Which leads to Jared frowning at the mirror, trying to figure out what about his eyebrows deserves a compliment.

It’s weird how easily they come to Bryce, how unselfconsciously he compliments Jared, or tells him he loves him, because he’s seen Bryce’s douchebro act, but then, it kind of isn’t, because he’s also heard a lot of calls between Bryce and his mom, and every single one ends with either ‘I love you’, or ‘I love you too’, presumably if Elaine’s the one saying it first.

That’s not how Jared’s family operates. He knows his family loves him, they know he loves them; sometimes, in very good or very bad moments, they say that they love each other, but it’s not an every day thing. Jared still feels faintly nervous whenever he tells Bryce he loves him, even though he loves the shit out of him, like it’ll stop meaning as much if he uses it all the time. Bryce obviously doesn’t have that problem.

Jared worries, sometimes, that Bryce like, doesn’t know how fucking awesome Jared thinks he is — like, out of bed, Jared’s mouth very much gets away from him in bed, Bryce can have zero doubts about Jared’s feelings about his absolute everything there. He knows Bryce is self-conscious, and gets shit said about him all the time, usually bad shit, but it’s just — hard for Jared to say nice things. Jared shows his love in chirping. Chirping and like, cuddling. Jared has zero issue with cuddling the shit out of Bryce, which is good, because Bryce is a super touchy person, at least with him.

But he feels guilty after that weekend, because, well,  _seventeen_ , and it’s not even like it was more than usual, he’s pretty sure, that is just an ordinary weekend in the Marcus-Matheson household, so he tries another little experiment. He gives himself a goal of seven. Seventeen is probably beyond him.

It’s weird, because it’s hard at first? Like, Jared’s scrambling, but Bryce grins at him when Jared compliments his shirt — it _is_ a nice shirt, but it probably costs a — Jared does not include that part. He fucking preens when Jared comments on how soft his hair is — way better without gel, which Jared also manages not to mention. He gets almost bashful when he mentions something about the Oilers PP and Jared states the obvious — that his hockey IQ is killer. By the end of the day, Bryce is wandering around beaming like he’s gotten everything he’s ever wanted, and Jared is caught between feeling proud of himself and like, the worst boyfriend ever.

“I love you, you know that?” Jared mumbles against Bryce’s back that night, feeling guilty, but it eases a little when Bryce says, “I know,” without hesitation, then, like it’s the easiest thing in the world, “Love you too.”


	35. Morgan/Theo; gratitude

There is a day — it’s not a day that Morgan marks, except it totally is, it’s a Sunday — that Morgan thinks his plan of winning over the Roys is finally complete, because that is the day that Theo Roy smiles at him. He doesn’t even do anything to earn it, really, just hands the remote over when Theo sits down on the other end of the couch, because Morgan’s just idly watching Sportscenter, and he knows that isn’t really Theo’s thing.

“Thanks,” Theo says, smiling at him, and it’s not the first time Morgan’s seen Theo smile or anything, but it’s the first time it’s been directed at him, at least in a way that isn’t sarcastic. There have been a lot of sarcastic smiles through Morgan’s pitiful attempts to win him over. This one looks genuine.

“You’re — welcome,” Morgan says, kind of stumbling over it. Must be the shock.

Theo turns on Netflix, and they sit in complete silence through an episode and a half of Community before Morgan’s dragged into the basement by Frederick, who wants Morgan to be goalie for him again.

It’s probably Kai’s doing. Not just because Theo’s been — well, Morgan wouldn’t say  _nice_ , exactly, but maybe less mean? — since Kai apparently had a chat with him, but also because Kai won’t shut up about how awesome he is and how Morgan should be forever indebted to him. He makes Morgan tie his skates before practice three times before Morgan rebels.

“You owe me, Fraser!” Kai yells. “Come back!”

“Not gonna!” Morgan counters, and runs right into Bruno.

Bruno raises a single eyebrow. It is a very talented eyebrow, because it says ‘watch where you’re going’ and ‘you kids are ridiculous’ and ‘explain’ all at once. Maybe after your fifth kid is born you get superpowers. That would explain Morgan’s grandma. She had six kids, and she definitely had facial expression superpowers. No one can make you feel guilty with a look like his grandma.

“Theo’s finally being less mean to me, and Kai’s taking the credit,” Morgan says, because it’s not like Bruno doesn’t know his own kid.

Bruno laughs, clapping Morgan on the back. “Fitting right in with the Roys.”

Morgan tries not to beam, but Bruno also has a superpower where Morgan desperately wants to impress him, so he fails, he’s pretty sure.

“I hope so,” he says.

“Lace my skates you giant suckup,” Kai calls from across the room, and Morgan gives him the finger and bolts before Kai can come after him.


	36. Kiro&David (David/Jake, Kiro/Em); cat-call

Davidson is like a cat.

“Explain,” Em says.

“Isn’t he?” Kirill asks.

“Oh, I’m not disagreeing with your thesis here,” Em says. “Just asking you to expand on it.”

Davidson is like a cat in many, many ways. He’s skittish sometimes, for one, and doesn’t like to be touched unless he’s decided you are a good person, in which case he’s perfectly happy — good people, to Kirill’s knowledge, include himself, Jake, Robbie, Oleg, Slava — though David still looks faintly terrified whenever Slava does touch him, like Slava will break his bones with a slap on the back — his agent, and, recently, Em, which makes Kirill happy. Also Orange, though obviously Orange is less Good People and more Fellow Cat.

Em looks amused, which is good, because sometimes Kirill thinks the reason he was put on this earth was to make Emily Victoria Ross laugh as much as possible. He takes his true purpose in life very seriously.

“Not the most convincing evidence, Kir,” Em says. “I know plenty of people who aren’t generally touchy.”

But it’s not that Davidson isn’t touchy. Davidson’s very touchy, he’s just particular about who’s allowed to touch him. When Kirill hugs him he can feel the way David practically crumples into it, like all it took was contact for him to let himself relax. Kirill has his suspicions about just how little David was hugged, on ice cellies excepted, until recent years, so he does his best to make up for it, is pretty sure Jacobson does the same. It’s not that they wouldn’t hug him anyway, they just hug him extra.

Sometimes Kirill can feel contentment from David just because they’re in the same place, and it’s very similar to the contentment he can feel from Orange when she’s halfway across the room, back to him, but quietly purring to herself because he’s home.

“David purrs?” Em asks.

“On the inside,” Kirill says. “On the inside, absolutely.”

*

Usually, when Kirill’s coming into Washington, David reacts much like Orange after an away trip, the human equivalent of running to the door to meet him and then purring in his lap the moment he sits down. Less in his lap than in Jacobson’s lap, probably, once they’re behind closed doors, but David’s actually more affectionate with Kirill in public, probably because, unlike things with Jake, he’s not concerned about hiding it.

But right now, right now David is bristly. Like a cat who shuns their owner when they’ve been away too long. He should remember to present that to Em as further evidence of his theory when he calls her tonight.

David is very, very bad at being injured. It’s not that he complains incessantly — he doesn’t complain at all. Every time Kirill asks how his ankle’s feeling the answer is always one of the patented Davidson ‘fine’s, which means it isn’t, but he refuses to admit it. It’s not that he’s not taking care of rehab, or rushing into it either: Kirill didn’t even need to be there to know he’s following every single one of his doctor’s orders precisely. So, objectively, he’s probably good at being injured, at least in comparison to the players who make sure everyone else around them is miserable too, or risk their long-term health to get back to the ice faster, or drop the conditioning and end up out longer than they were supposed to be.

He’s being bitchy about it, though. Kirill loves him a lot, but he is very aware of his faults.

“He’s not being bitchy,” Jacobson says after they have to leave a very grumpy Davidson for pre-game, sounding both very offended and also like he’s lying his ass off.

Kirill raises a single eyebrow.

“He’s hurt,” Jake says. “It’s understandable if he’s a little—”

Bitchy. Bitchy is the word. It was one thing over the phone, but in person, it is something very different. He gave bad hugs and he shrank away from contact and he looked resentful of their health, and he was bitchy.

“He was not,” Jake mutters, but not with very much conviction.

“You staying at his place tonight?” Kirill asks.

Jake looks unsure.

“Hmmm,” Kirill says, and Jake scowls at him.

“He’ll be fine after the game,” Jake says.

“If the Caps win,” Kirill says.

“If the Caps win,” Jake obliges. He knows Davidson’s faults too, even if he’s lying about them.

The Caps do win, even with a number of injured players, because Devon Crane decides today is the day he’s going to hold a goaltending clinic. Well, he does that many days. Kirill likes him, but, while Kirill knows many talented hockey players, Crane’s the one whose talent Kirill finds frankly offensive. It’s the eyes, Kirill thinks. The eyes say he’s thinking of murdering every single one of them, but he’ll settle for murdering their hopes and dreams if he must.

Kirill is perhaps not quite over the Olympics.

 _You can come over if you want_ , is waiting for Kirill when he gets off the ice, since the Caps have won, and presumably for Jacobson as well, but he comes over, looking tired.

“I’ve got to deal with a rookie crisis,” Jake says. “You go ahead, I’ll join you in a bit?”

“Okay,” Kirill says. “Big thing?”

“Homesick, I think,” Jake says, and Kirill nods. His first year in America, he nearly got on a plane half a dozen times. It can get overwhelming. “Shouldn’t be more than an hour, if it looks like it’s serious I’ll tap Joe.”

Davidson is extra bristly when he answers the door, so Jake must have let him know he’d be held up.

“Your consolation prize is here!” Kirill says, holding his arms out.

David scowls, but says, “You’re not a consolation prize,” after a moment, and lets him into his injury den. It really doesn’t look much different than usual, no messier, or neater, but you can sense David’s irritation everywhere.

“Quit being grumpy,” Kirill says.

“I’m not,” David lies.

Kirill keeps holding his arms out, and David tromps into them after a moment, blowing out a sigh. “I want to play,” he mutters into Kirill’s shoulder after a moment.

“I know,” Kirill says. There is no one who could possibly doubt that David wants to play.

David makes a grumpy noise, and Kirill rubs his back a little before pulling away.

“Come, I am a very good ankle rest,” Kirill says.

“That’s probably not a good—” Davidson says, but Kirill eyes him quiet.

“Fine,” he says, and clomps his way to the couch in his ankle brace, leery, but letting Kirill arrange him until he’s half draped over him, ankle propped up enough that he won’t jar it.

“Good?” Kirill says, and Davidson nods a little, handing Kirill the remote. Kirill puts it on an old episode of Mythbusters, paying only half attention, while Davidson relaxes by degrees, until Kirill’s got the David equivalent of a cat in his lap.

When Jake knocks an episode later, Davidson looks like he’s going to get up for a moment, but then he clearly decides against it, and Kirill has a Davidson to support, so that leaves him out too.

“You have a key!” David calls out before slumping even more into Kirill, and Kirill gives Jacobson a slightly smug smile when he comes in, but he looks too relieved to see Davidson back to his cat self to be annoyed, just makes himself room on David’s other side.

“Cool, Mythbusters,” Jake says, wrapping his hand around David’s uninjured ankle, and Kirill can hear David purring, even though he doesn’t make a single sound.


	37. Mike/Liam; never grow up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Post Thrown Off the Ice, with all that implies. Massive spoilers below: if you haven’t read TOTI you shouldn’t read this.

A week after the funeral, Lori comes by. She doesn’t call ahead, drops in right while Liam was trying to muster up the energy to take Bella for a walk, because it’s been the backyard for her lately, most of the time, and that’s not fair to her. Mike would be pissed. Mike’s not there to be pissed, which feels worse than getting bawled out. Liam would fucking kill to be bawled out right now.

But Bella needs him, needs the exercise, and Liam’s — he shouldn’t resent that, but he resents that, resents her still being there right up until she’s curling up at the foot the bed at night, and he doesn’t have to sleep alone. He should walk her. Five more minutes, he’ll get up.

It’s at least fifteen minutes later when the doorbell rings, at least Liam thinks so. Time’s been weird, lately. Everything’s been weird, lately. People keep coming to his door, bringing food and booze and hugs, like they don’t think he can take care of himself without Mike there, and honestly they’re probably right. Roman brought dog food yesterday. That was thoughtful. Liam was running out, and the thought of driving to the grocery store made him feel sick.

Lori has a casserole dish in her arms. Mike would have winced to see that. She’s not as bad a cook as Mike always claimed, but then, everyone’s a bad cook compared to Mike. There’s food in the freezer that Mike made, saved; soup, meatballs, a casserole of his own. Liam’s afraid to eat any of it, get a taste of something he won’t ever have again.

“Can I come in?” Lori asks.

“I was about to take Bella for a walk,” Liam says. Within the hour, at least. Maybe.

“Well, let’s go for a walk, then,” Lori says, so Liam guesses Bella’s finally getting a walk. He takes the long way to the park, because he can’t walk where — he takes the long way to the park, and Lori doesn’t say anything about it.

“Have you left the house since the funeral?” Lori asks.

Liam shrugs.

“Not really?” Lori asks.

“I mean,” Liam says, wonders if she’d count the couple walks he has taken Bella on, the walk to the convenience store two blocks away. Probably not. “Not really.”

“He’d hate you doing this to yourself, Liam,” Lori says.

“He doesn’t really have a say anymore,” Liam says, then, “Sorry. Fuck — I’m.”

“It’s fine,” she says.

She doesn’t know how he’s feeling, but she’s probably the closest. Probably feeling just as bad. They say grief’s worst for parents losing their kids. Liam doesn’t know how they calculate that. From where he’s standing, he can’t think of anything worse than this.

“I don’t know how to live without him,” Liam admits. “I’ve been — I don’t know how to, anymore. I can’t even — he was the only one the dishwasher worked for, and I burn toast, and I can’t get the TV to work, and I don’t —”

Lori pulls him into a hug. She hugs like Mike, hard. Tom does too, like if you’re special enough that Lori or her kids are going to bother to hug you, they’re putting everything they have in it.

“He always told me I’d have to grow up eventually because he wouldn’t be around forever, but I didn’t want to because it meant he wouldn’t be there, and I don’t know how to,” Liam says. “I don’t  _want_ to.”

“I know,” she says.

“I’m so fucking mad at him,” Liam says. “I’m so fucking mad at him right now, and he needs to be here so I can yell at him, but he  _isn’t_ , and I don’t want —”

“I know,” she says softly. “I know, Liam, me too.”

“I don’t  _want_ to,” Liam mumbles, and he knows he sounds like a petulant little kid right now, he knows that, and he knows he has to, has to finish walking Bella and go home to that stupid fucking house that Mike isn’t in anymore, but he can’t, not yet, so he just keeps holding on, Lori rubbing his back as he cries into her shoulder.


	38. Bryce, Chaz, Flames; tagalong

Rossi’s a good fit from the start. Some guys are just like that, click immediately, not necessarily on the ice — Rossi’s played well, a good utility player, but he’s not going to be gunning for the Calder or anything — but with the room, in a way that feels like they’ve been around for years. The older guys treat him like a newfound little brother — Patrick finds himself doing it himself, though he’d considered himself sort of in the middle of the Flames cohort: too old to be a young gun, too single and unsettled to hang with the husbands and fathers — and he fits right in with the younger guys.

He’s friendly, but not in the way that’s overbearing, mature for his age, but not in a too serious way, doesn’t seem to be trying to fit in, which is maybe why it works. So if anyone was going to get Marcus actually friendly — Patrick still hasn’t seen shit that matches the horror stories, but he always hangs back a little, not quite  _team_  — it’s not really surprising it’s Rossi.

The other guys seem shocked by it, though. Maybe not by it being Rossi, exactly, but by the fact that, more and more at team shit, Rossi’s sticking with Marcus.

“How does he even stand him?” Ironman asks.

“Maybe he’s sucking up to the talent?” Patty says, then at Ironman’s look, “What.”

“There’s more likable talent,” Ironman says, in a blatant self-flex.

“You catch up to Marcus in points, you let me know,” Patty says, and Ironman gives him the finger.

Patrick’s kind of uncomfortable with the whole conversation, feels like he accidentally walked into Mean Girls or something. Marcus, at his worst, has never been even close to as bad as some of them act like he is, and while he’s been assured he was worse before, Patrick figures he’s just grown up a bit. It happens.

Patrick at nineteen wasn’t exactly someone he’d want to hang out with now. He’s sure the team vets felt the same way, though he doesn’t remember them showing it, and certainly not as blatantly as Patterson and Casterley are. It’s just one of the things about a hockey team: you’ve got kids fresh out of high school, you’ve got guys with kids almost that age, you’ve got everything in between. Not everyone’s going to click.

“Rossi doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy who sucks up to the all-stars,” Patrick says.

“True,” Patty says. “You think of another reason—”

“Maybe he just likes the guy,” Patrick says, not particularly impressed when they act like he’s the funniest man alive for suggesting it.

*

“What’re they giggling about?” Luke mumbles.

It’s too early for this. Team breakfast is for caffeine and calories, not noise. Usually he could count on Marcus for being one of the ones who knew exactly what breakfast was for. He might run his mouth at other times, always the loudest in the room when it comes to who bragging about who gets their dick sucked best, who bagged the hottest chick, conversations Luke isn’t exactly taking part in, but the rest of the time he’s a sullen little shit. 

Not this morning, though. This morning him and Rossi are giggling like teenage girls. Luke wouldn’t be in the mood for it any morning, but he’s got a headache throbbing behind one eye, his hands are fucked, and the two Tylenol he took when he woke up haven’t done a thing for ether. He’s not even sure he’s going to be able to shove them in his gloves, let alone play. Let alone  _fight_ , and he bets Greene’s going to be gunning for a rematch after last time.

“Fuck knows,” Watson mumbles back through a piece of toast. A man with the right priorities. “Trading dick sucking tips?”

Luke drags his toast through ketchup, doesn’t bother to laugh. It’s a weak fucking chirp. “Someone’s pissed Rossi took his spot,” he says.

“Fuck off, Morris,” Watson says. “Be taking yours tonight, you can barely fucking use a fork.”

Luke shrugs. He might not be wrong. Depends if the trainers will give him shots again. They didn’t last time he asked, but then, last time they were playing the Leafs. Sharks are a little more important, and Watson hasn’t played better than shit all season, probably on his way to waivers.

Marcus and Rossi are still on their giggle shit, and it’s grinding on Luke’s nerves. He shoves his toast in his mouth, finishes the dregs of his coffee. “Going back to my room,” he says, and Watson doesn’t look up, suddenly fucking obsessed with looking at his eggs. Touchy today. Well, Luke would be too if he knew he was a breath away from going to Stockton. They may as well do it now, cut down on travel costs.

Luke pops two Aleve when he gets back to his room, hopes it makes a difference, though he’s pretty sure it won’t.

*

Pete doesn’t give a flying fuck what happens off the ice. Well, that’s not true: he’s not heartless, he’s happy for a guy if he gets married, or has a kid, and he feels for them if someone in the family dies. They’re his guys. But the petty little shit, the bickering, the partying he knows some of the guys are doing, the drugs he knows some of the guys are doing, that shit, as long as it doesn’t hit the ice, it’s none of his fucking business. It affects their play, that’s when he’s getting involved.

A blind eye is the best thing for a coach to have: he’s seen some of the coaches that get involved in shit that doesn’t concern performance, and it tends to lead to a room that fucking hates you for sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong, acting like you’re their fucking father. They play good, they’re good.

Marcus is the best guy Pete’s got, is only going to get better, especially if he gets a rein on that temper. Pete knows he’s had off ice shit, but that’s for the media to give a shit about, not him. He takes some stupid fucking penalties when he gets riled, which Pete does give a shit about, but he’s getting better about it. Still young. Guys do stupid shit when they’re young.

It’s not that Pete doesn’t know the team doesn’t like Marcus much, but you can’t tell when they’re on the ice, so it’s something for the guys with letters to deal with, not him. Still, his business or not, when Rossi comes in, starts trailing Marcus around, Pete’s not gonna lie: it’s a bit of a relief.


	39. Chaz, Bryce; mentoring

They’re just wrapping up the shooting drills when Bryce skates over to him. Chaz is on go four, and he better get it soon, because the last guy left always has to do something stupid. BJ nailed it on the first go, so by all rights he should be back in the room rather than in the loser line, and he gets some side-eyes for it, a “Fuck off, you already had yours,” from the net.

“Stay after practice?” BJ says.

“Gotta anyway,” Chaz says. “Puck duty.”

“After that, though,” Bryce says.

Chaz shrugs. “Not doing anything else,” he says.

Chaz thankfully gets out of the loser line after a pretty sloppy dangle — Nik’s clearly tiring, after shot one hundred or so — but he’s got to stick around anyway, like he said, leans against the boards beside Bryce and watches the remaining guys try to get past the goal line. It’s weird — if Chaz didn’t know BJ was paying close attention to basically anything he’d think he was zoning out, but having heard him talk about this roster, he can tell how intent he is on it, eyes tracking everything, even though it’s just a dumb mock shootout, the thing they always wrap up practice, warm-ups with, something he’s probably watched hundreds of times.

Bryce helps Chaz pick up the pucks after everyone’s left — Dukes was the last guy in line, and grumpy about it, which isn’t surprising, considering how creative Patter can be about ‘punishment’.

“What’s up, BJ?” Chaz asks. “Something up with you and J?”

“No,” Bryce says. “We’re good. I was just — can I give you some advice? Like, hockey advice.”

“Yeah, ‘course,” Chaz says.

“Really?” Bryce asks, sounding weirdly surprised.

“Dude, I’m trying to make a career out of this,” Chaz says. “And it’ll be a pretty short one if I don’t take advice from dudes who know better than me.”

“I wouldn’t say I know better,” Bryce says anxiously, and Chaz suddenly has a hunch.

“J doesn’t take constructive criticism well, huh?” Chaz asks. Chaz, for one, is shocked. Shocked, he says.

“No, he does,” Bryce says, all solemnly big eyed, like the sarcasm went right over his head. “He does now, I mean, it was like — basically the first thing I ever said to him was that he was fucking up his stretch.”

“And then he fucked it up harder out of spite?” Chaz asks.

“I mean,” Bryce hedges, which is totally a yes. That’s the Jared Matheson Chaz knows and is weirdly fond of.

“Don’t worry, I’m not going to get offended at you for giving me advice,” Chaz says. “What am I fucking up?”

“You’re not fucking up anything,” BJ says.

“Quit being like, diplomatic and help me fix it,” Chaz says.

“I mean it, you’re not fucking up,” Bryce says. “I was just watching the shootouts and I think you can improve on your snapshot? There’s this little — thing you’re doing that, it’s not —” He gets all flustered the further he gets into his sentence, and it’s funny, because he can like, rip plays and players into component parts when he’s talking about someone else, but apparently he can’t say it to someone’s face.

“Can you show me?” Chaz asks, and Bryce grabs the pail of pucks that they just so painstakingly picked up — being a rookie sucks — and dumps it out, which Chaz tries not to wince at. All that work. At least BJ will probably help him pick them up again.

“Okay, so,” Bryce says, looking way more comfortable when there’s a stick in his hand and a puck on his stick. Not surprising, considering how good the guy is. Chaz would be straight up cocky if he could play like Bryce Marcus, and Bryce can be sometimes, in the room, on the ice, but mostly he isn’t. Like, he clearly knows he’s fucking baller, but he’s not obnoxious about it like Ironman and Patter can be. And they’re not even as good as BJ.

“Show me the magic, Marcus,” Chaz says, and Bryce grins at him then, all teeth.


	40. Jared, Julius, Oilers; spider duty

Look, Jared knows it’s not reasonable. If you don’t live in like, Australia, or South America or wherever it is that all the deadly ones are, any spider you see is going to be harmless, and probably a net positive for the world, and like, all that stuff.

“What?” Julius says, which is probably a reasonable question since Jared’s literally standing on his bed.

“Spider,” Jared says, and is utterly mortified that it comes out squeaky. He’s waiting for Julius to roll his eyes, go kill it for him, or maybe trap it with a glass while murmuring ‘don’t be scared, I’m just bringing you outside, buddy’ like Bryce does, but instead Jared nearly falls off the bed because Julius may be light for a hockey player, but if someone his size jumps onto the bed, it bounces. Hard. Your balance also tends to get a little fucked up when that hockey player is clinging to you like a koala bear.

“Um,” Jared says, momentarily distracted by the fact he’s got to reconsider basically everything about his roommate, because he’s apparently a wimp — yes, Jared is aware this is hypocritical, but he acknowledges he is a wimp about spiders himself, he is not in denial about that — until Julius says, “Where?”, and Jared finds out that he doesn’t know the answer, because it’s _moved_.

It could be  _anywhere_.

It’s possible Jared’s hyperventilating as he searches for it, but it might just be that Julius is hyperventilating in his ear and he’s hearing that. Or they’re both hyperventilating. It’s honestly probably that one.

“Text Rogers?” Julius says, and that’s a good idea. Rogers probably isn’t afraid of spiders. But then, Jared wouldn’t have thought Julius was, so maybe it’d be three of them up on the bed, and someone would have to open the door for him to let him in, which means leaving safety. Jared suddenly desperately wants his dad here, or Bryce and his weirdly calm spider handling, has this moment of overwhelming homesickness. In Calgary he has spider people for him, and here he’s just got Julius panicking right beside him, and —

“There!” Julius says, pointing, and it’s  _on the bed with them_.

Jared’s jumped onto Julius’ bed before he even considers moving, and Julius is bolting to the door. Jared can’t believe he’s leaving him alone with it. Unless he’s getting help. Jared hopes he’s getting help.

“What the fuck?” Jared hears, and then Brouwer’s being dragged into their room. Either Julius is way stronger than Jared thought, or he got him by surprise.

“The fuck is going on?” Brouwer says.

Julius mutely points to the bed.

“Oh for christsakes, it’s tiny,” Brouwer says. “Matheson, get off the bed.”

Jared is going nowhere until the spider’s gone.

“Fine,” Brouwer says, going into their bathroom and coming out with a wad of toilet paper.

“Don’t kill it!” Julius says, but it’s too late.

“You killed it,” Julius says, sounding betrayed. Jared does not feel betrayed. Jared feels only relief. He sinks onto Julius’ bed.

“Thank you,” Jared manages through the pounding of his heart.

Brouwer just rolls his eyes, goes to toss the toilet paper and is out the door without a word.

There’s a spider stain on Jared’s comforter. Jared wonders if it has friends that will come for revenge.

“Do you think they’d let us change rooms?” Jared asks.

Apparently they don’t let you change rooms because there was a spider in yours, and he’s worried him and Julius are going to be up all night with the lights on until Fitzgerald offers to switch with them. He keeps laughing at them all obnoxiously, and he’s probably never going to let them live it down, but Jared, in the safety of Fitzgerald’s room, doesn’t even care about the chirping they’ve gotten, are going to keep getting.

Julius checks the room thoroughly before they go to sleep that night, and Jared, drowsily texting Bryce, who keeps sending crying laughing emojis at him, trusts him to make sure they’re safe to sleep.


	41. Luke/Andreas, Luke/Nikita; hindsight

There’s a bit in Andreas that’s furious with Luke when he finds out, because long-term relationships, you’re not supposed to have secrets, and they may have quit, Andreas may have quit, but that was long past the point where this should have been something Andreas had known.

There’s a lot of Andreas that’s furious with Luke, at first, and he doesn’t realize, right away, that’s because there’s no one else he can direct it towards.

At sixteen, Andreas was hyper-focused. He barely had friends, let alone anyone he was willing to kiss, assuming anyone wanted to kiss him. 

They didn’t.

At sixteen, Luke locked himself into a relationship that lasted a decade, and he never told Andreas about it, never even hinted at it. When Andreas asked him, he said his experience had been ‘casual, all casual’, and Andreas, the opposite of casual, had somehow found relief in that, before he realized ‘Luke’ and ‘casual’ weren’t going to share space inside of him.

Casual, Luke said. Like he hadn’t made a routine of beating the shit out of someone and kissing it better.

Or, more likely, beating the shit out of someone, and biting it deeper.

Andreas can’t talk to him for a week, and when Luke tells him he understands, that he deserves it, Andreas is almost angrier with Luke than he is with himself.

*

Andreas remembers a moment — it must have been ten years ago. Early on. Remembers saying “I’m too old for baggage,” and all Luke said was, “I feel you.”

In hindsight, Andreas is angrier with himself.

*

It was hard to picture it, at first. Picture Luke doing that, letting someone do that to him. But Andreas has seen him fight, and there’s something feral about it, about him, that he’s never seen any other time. Like part of him’s disappeared, or like part of him only exists then. 

Andreas was always worried, watching him do it, to think anything but ‘not the face’, cross his fingers Luke wouldn’t be out with a concussion. He hated watching him fight. He wished he did it less. And that — that was a few times a season. He looked at Luke’s fight card. He fought Nikita Sidorchuk four times in one season. And then, Andreas guesses, hurting the whole time, they fucked.

Luke never gave him a name, but it isn’t hard to put things together. Add up the player Luke fought most in his career, a player who was on the Rebels roster with him, it’s not even putting together two and two.

*

Here’s the thing about Luke Morris:

He’s never raised a hand to Andreas, but more than that, he’s never been anything but — gentle isn’t the word. Considerate, maybe. Like whatever Andreas wanted, that’s what he wanted to give. Andreas didn’t know him at sixteen, at twenty, at twenty-six, but he has a feeling that wasn’t something new. That it was Luke doing what Sidorchuk wanted him to. That he’d bleed if Sidorchuk wanted him to.

He doesn’t want to think about it. He can’t stop thinking about it.

Here’s the thing about Luke Morris:

Andreas loves him, and he’s genuinely not sure which makes him feel more sick: if Sidorchuk loved him too, or if he didn’t.


	42. Nikolaj/Ryan; restraint

You brace yourself before you face the media. It’s something Nikolaj is very accustomed to — you take a moment, and you let your skin harden, and you face their stupid questions, and you don’t give them anything, you don’t leave them anywhere to push, but his head doesn’t feel screwed on right tonight. 

He cleared the ImPACT test, so he knows it’s not a concussion, but he’s felt shaky, off-balance since he went into the boards — makes sense, since he was off-balance when he went into them — and he starts out fine, but after a question that’s more of a thinly veiled insult, Nikolaj finds himself snapping, “If you have something to say, just say it.”

The group in front of him looks uncomfortable, but Nikolaj doesn’t even care, because he doesn’t say it, and they wrap up the questions after that.

It isn’t until after he’s showered and changed that he considers how it’s going to look, more evidence in the pile of coldhearted prick they like to portray him as, the portrayal he can’t shake no matter what he does. He’s pretty much given up on trying, but he does try not to give them any ammunition. Between tonight and the last few games, narrow losses they’re treating like blowouts, open questions about his leadership, he hasn’t handed them ammunition as much as a powder keg. 

He runs into Epstein on his way out, wonders why that always happens. Maybe not always, but either he stays later, works harder than any of the beat guys, or he’s stalking Nikolaj.

That doesn’t even make sense. Nikolaj needs to go home, get some sleep, start reassembling himself.

“You okay, Madsen?” Epstein asks, has the temerity to look concerned, friendly, like it isn’t something he’d be writing up after. “That hit in the second—”

“Any official injury updates come from the Sabres organization,” Nikolaj tells him.

“I know,” Epstein says. “I just —”

“I have to go,” Nikolaj says, mortified to hear something in his voice that shouldn’t be there. Not a shake, but a crack, maybe.

“Nikolaj,” Epstein says. “Do you need—”

Nikolaj doesn’t hear the rest of his question, keeps his head down and his gait fast as he walks to the parking lot, but he wonders how he was going to finish.


	43. Morgan/Theo; vibes

Theo knows Alexia doesn’t do it out of malice. The whole family already knows. And not just the Roys, or the Roy household exactly — Kai knows, and Grigory knows, and uncle Tommie, who like, isn’t actually Theo’s uncle but played on dad’s line for seven years and comes by for dinner every time the Scouts come to town and mortifyingly always asks if there’s a guy in his life. She probably just kind of forgot Morgan wasn’t part of that group.

He knows she didn’t do it out of malice, unlike the chirping him about being forever single —  _that_  was out of malice — because when Morgan goes wide-eyed, and Theo elbows her, hard, like bruising hard, she doesn’t yell for mom, just gives him big ‘I fucked up’ eyes and mumbles a ‘sorry’ he barely hears on the way to his room.

There’s a knock on his door a minute later, and he doesn’t yell, “Fuck off” just in case it’s his mom, who would ground him, mitigating circumstances or not, but he doesn’t answer either, and whoever it is, Alexia, his mom, doesn’t push.

 _So Alex just told Morgan about me_ , Theo texts Kai.

Kai immediately responds with a  _was he a dick about it? if he was I will beat him up in practice and g and your dad will hold him down for me._

 _Idk, I didn’t stick around_ , Theo texts, and then ignores Kai’s multiple eye roll emojis in response.

*

Morgan’s dead tired. No one told him how fucking exhausting a rookie season was. Or, okay, they kind of did, there was definitely a ‘this is going to be harder on you than Juniors’, but they didn’t take him by the shoulders and repeat it until he knew it down to his bones. His bones, which hurt. He feels old. He feels so old right now, everything all creaky.

So maybe he isn’t paying much attention to whatever back and forth Alexia and Theo have going, just letting the tone of bickering wash over him until he hears the word ‘boyfriend’ from Alexia, cutting and sarcastic and shooting Theo’s way, that he clicks back in.

Alexia’s always struck Morgan as one of the kids who’d do anything to be part of the popular group, and Morgan knows the way being mean is kind of prized, sometimes, with those kids, like if you want to stay up you’d better keep shoving everyone else down, but she really didn’t strike him as the gay joke kind of kid.

Theo elbows her, walks away, and it isn’t until he hears Alexia mumble ‘sorry’ after him, then, turning to Morgan, hissing, “You can’t tell anyone,” before darting upstairs after Theo that Morgan realises it wasn’t actually a joke.

If he hadn’t realised then, Kai texting him soon after with,  _you better not be a dick about this._  is more than enough confirmation.

 _I wouldn’t_ , Morgan texts back, because obviously he wouldn’t. And he’d like to think that — there’s context Kai’s missing, yeah, but he’d like to think that he didn’t seem like the kind of guy who would. He doesn’t think he does, at least. Hopes it’s a case of better safe than sorry than Morgan unconsciously emitting ‘I’m a giant homophobe’ signals. It’d be like, killer for his love life, for one. Not that he has one. Maybe that’s why he doesn’t have one? Among a million other reasons.

 _Do I give off homophobe vibes or something?_ Morgan texts Kai.

 _no I’m just making sure_ , Kai texts back, and Morgan blows out a breath, relieved. But then, that’s just Kai. Maybe he does to others. Maybe he does to Theo. It’s pretty obvious that Kai already knew about him, and Alexia brought it up in the kind of casual bickering way that implies other people do too, that it’s not some big secret, except Morgan’s been living here for months and he didn’t know, so. Maybe he gives off that vibe to non-Kais? He hopes not. He knows exactly how shitty it is, holding it in, knowing exactly how people around you would react if you told.

Except it’s different, obviously. For one, Theo doesn’t seem to be holding it in at all, may have worried about Morgan’s reaction, but not anyone else. And of course not: the Roys are lovely people, and even when they’re not lovely, they’re still the kind of family you know has each other’s backs, would support Theo without batting an eye.

It’s really fucking stupid to be jealous of a sixteen year old, but here Morgan is. Still, jealous or not, he doesn’t deserve to be sitting in his room, wondering if Morgan’s going to be an asshole about it, tell people, so he should probably fix that, or something. Like. Now.

Morgan thinks every single one of his bones protests when he stands, and that’s the only reason he groans.

*

There’s another knock on the door while Theo’s pointedly ignoring a string of texts from Kai that’s just the eye roll again and again and again, like he can annoy Theo into answering — he cannot — and Theo doesn’t answer that one either, but the door opens anyway.

“Hi,” Morgan says.

“It’s polite to wait for someone to answer you,” Theo says.

“Sorry,” Morgan mumbles, then doesn’t say anything.

“Can I help you, or are you just here to lurk?” Theo asks.

“It’s like, not a big deal,” Morgan says, so visibly uncomfortable in the way he’s shifting from foot to foot it’s infuriating. It’s like he’s never met someone gay before. Who knows, maybe he hasn’t. He’s from some small prairie town, Theo’s pretty sure, where everyone probably keeps their mouth shut until they can get the fuck out of dodge.

“I know,” Theo says. “Can you—”

“I—” Morgan says, and Theo’s fascinated by how many expressions just crossed his face, all uncomfortable, but different forms of uncomfortable. Also annoyed, because it’s not like he asked for some supportive speech or whatever, so Morgan doesn’t have to strain himself.

“If you’re going to give me like, the ‘you’re gay and that’s okay’ thing,” Theo says. “I’m aware. And have heard it like, twenty times. So you can, you know. Not.”

“I mean, it  _is_  okay,” Morgan says.

“I know it’s okay,” Theo says. “If that was all, thank you for coming, please shut the door on your way out.”

“I don’t—” Morgan says.

“Door,” Theo says.

“Okay,” Morgan says, but he leaves it the tiniest bit ajar when he leaves, and Theo, huffing out a breath, has to get up to shut it properly.


	44. David, Jake, various traumatized draftees; awkward

Cory can’t fucking wait for the draft to happen. And yeah, there’s the obvious there — he wants to know who he’s going to, he wants to start his NHL career, or at least his prospect one, because D-men pulled up at eighteen aren’t exactly common, but also he wants these interviews to end. Like. Now.

It’s not the interviews themselves? Or, it kind of is, there’s only so many times you can answer the same questions over and over without being really bored, and that goes for both the media ones and the ones with teams, especially when he’s talking to a team who’s going like, tenth, and they know he won’t be available then, and he knows he won’t be available then, and it feels like a waste of time.

The main thing is that the interviews with the top prospects are super awkward. Most of the guys are fine? Jake Lourdes seems nice, and Cory already knew Shea, likes Shea, especially when he doesn’t have to play him. It’s just when they’re all in the same place there’s something all off about the energy. That sounds like a hippie thing to say or something, but Shea doesn’t make fun of him when he says it, just agrees straight off.

“It’s Chapman,” Shea says.

It’s definitely partly Chapman? Like, Cory’s super over the interviews, but he knows better than to show it, and Chapman clearly doesn’t care if everyone around him knows he thinks they’re wasting his time. Which makes the media uncomfortable, but also makes Cory uncomfortable, and he finds himself answering questions with extra enthusiasm when they bother to ask him — and they don’t, much, most of them are for Lourdes or Chapman — just to like, make up for him. 

But even though Jake’s nice and charismatic one on one, he doesn’t really seem to help the awkward atmosphere, just keeps looking over at Chapman, who won’t look at him, and Cory’s kind of worried at this point that if Jake goes first, Chapman’s going to Kanye West that shit, except instead of just saying something, he’ll try to grab the Panthers jersey and put it on.

“That would be the best draft ever,” Shea says, eyes shut, blindly handing Cory the bottle of whisky. They need it, okay? Draft stress is already bad enough without the shitshow of awkwardness they’ve been navigating. “Do you think the Panthers would just shrug and be like, ‘well, clearly he wants it, guess he’s ours now’.”

Cory snorts, takes a swig.

“Whatever, it’ll be over soon, at least,” Shea says.

“You’re the one who’s going to have to do all that post-draft shit with them,” Cory says.

“No, you’re killing my buzz,” Shea complains. “Fucking hell, dude.”

“Just glad it isn’t me,” Cory says.

*

It’s not that Cory isn’t happy to be drafted ahead of where he was supposed to go. It’s a fucking honour.

The post draft photo, Chapman attempts to murder Jake with his eyes, and Cory holds up three fingers, smiles the best he can, and pretends he doesn’t notice.


	45. Chaz, Bryce/Jared; unsubtle

Chaz doesn’t know if he’s the only guy on this roster who’s even halfway observant, or just the only guy who doesn’t go out of his way not to pay attention to BJ, but he’s definitely the only one who notices the ring on Bryce’s left hand before practice. Which is good, because obviously it’s good, but also — how? It is  _blinding._

Chaz goes over to BJ, says, “Talk to you outside a sec?” and Bryce, looking confused, follows him out of the room to the privacy of the hall.

“What’s up?” Bryce asks.

“You got a little something on your left hand,” Chaz says.

“Shit,” Bryce says, sliding it off. “Thanks.”

“You’re gonna put someone’s eye out with that shine,” Chaz says.

Bryce looks downright proud of himself with his, “I know.”

“J approved of that thing?” Chaz asks.

“He picked it,” BJ says, and then, because clearly Chaz’s face accurately conveys how little he believes that, “Well like, we picked together.”

“And he didn’t get veto rights, I guess,” Chaz says, and Bryce grins.

“Nah, he said I could get what I wanted,” he says, and Chaz can just imagine J’s face when Bryce showed him what he decided on. There must have been so much regret. Chaz would have paid literally hundreds of dollars to have seen it.

“Can you—” Bryce asks, after he’s undone his chain, the ring huddled next to the JBM, which — Chaz has never paid attention to it, but right now he would put those hundreds of dollars he’d spend that Jared’s middle name starts with a B. Also that Bryce is possibly the most romantic guy who’s ever lived. Chaz should take tips. 

“Yeah, hunch down a bit,” Chaz says, and does the clasp for him. “Asking for trouble, Marcus?” he asks. “I mean, it’s kind of noticeable even if you’re wearing it around your neck.”

Bryce shrugs. “I wanted to have one too. I mean, it’s like. Obviously both of us are gonna wear wedding rings, so why not both engagement rings?”

“Gonna wear those wedding rings on your fingers?” Chaz says.

“I don’t know,” BJ says uncomfortably, and Chaz feels kind of bad for pushing. “Like, in private, yeah. And it’s not like we won’t be married just because the media doesn’t know about it. It’s none of their fucking business.”

“Whoa,” Chaz says, holds his hands up. “Wasn’t saying it was, just asking a question.”

“Sorry,” Bryce mumbles.

“No worries,” Chaz says. “Just, I’m on your side, dude.”

“I know,” Bryce says. “Thanks.”

“Seriously, no worries,” Chaz says. “Just like — maybe tuck it away, you know, because the guys are gonna notice eventually, and you know they’re gonna hound you for it.”

And not like, the normal kind of hounding, like if one of the other guys showed up sporting that thing on his neck. That’d be chirps, teasing, but not the kind of mean-spirited shit that Bryce would draw. Chaz doesn’t really know how to fix it, tries to shut it down when he hears it, but like — he’s not a rookie anymore, but he’s not far from it either, and there’s only so much he can do.

“I don’t care what they say,” Bryce says, but Chaz notices he tucks the ring and the pendant under his shirt before they go back in, undresses with his back to the room.


	46. Matt/Aaron; beautiful, balmy

****

There’s literally no one worse to date than a baseball player. And it isn’t just the schedule Aaron has — or, like, the away game part of the schedule, because it’s absolutely the schedule Aaron has. Or the schedule Matt has. Or the way their sports barely intersect.

“You want me to hook you up with one of the Raptors instead?” Trembs asks, and ducks just in time to avoid getting a roll of stick tape to the head. “Same season!” he yelps.

“I’ll season you,” Matt says.

“Bad,” Ripper calls.

“I dunno,” Larry says. “I think it had something to it. Spice. Seasoning, if you will.”

“Not you too,” Ripper moans.

Larry kisses his fingers. “Perfectly seasoned, Matty.”

“Thank you, Larry,” Matt says with a bow.

*

Aaron Skypes him after the game, the first time they’ve managed more than texts back and forth in almost a week. He looks relaxed, happy, tanned. It’s weird, considering there’s snow on the ground here, the fact that when Aaron left town it was still muggy with summer, but Matt knows he trains on the beach a lot, made noise about sand being good resistance before admitting he just likes being near the water. 

Matt gets it, honestly. Every summer his family would stay just outside of St. John, on the bay, and it wasn’t really — the water was cold, and clear, and sometimes they’d walk and walk and walk when the tide was out, look at it later, all their steps erased by fifty feet of water crashing against the cliffs. Matt can walk to the lake in ten minutes here, but it isn’t the same. It isn’t even similar. 

“What’s the weather there?” Aaron asks.

“I know you have that app on your phone and you’re just trying to rub it in,” Matt says.

“Guilty,” Aaron says. “It’s a beautiful, balmy—”

“Fuck off, Vasquez,” Matt says, then, “Get out of here with that grin.”

“I can go!” Aaron says, but it’s not much of a bluff. “Watched your game.”

“Yeah?” Matt says. “How’d I do?”

“You were okay,” Aaron says, and Matt snorts, but to be fair, he was okay. Not a distinguished night, though he wasn’t actively bad. One major pro about dating an athlete, amidst all the schedule shit: Aaron isn’t going to blow smoke up his ass about his play, knows exactly how little it helps to be told you did great when you didn’t, were good when you were bad. Matt routinely tells Aaron he was great, but then, he _is_ great. One of the best things going for the Jays great.

Matt’s franchise, maybe, but he kind of stumbled ass backwards into that. It wasn’t that he was some standout they built a team around, just that he’s the rare guy who actually just keeps on playing for the team he was drafted to, and at a certain point, if they’re not going to get a good return for him, there’s no point rocking the boat or the room by sending him away.

He makes peanuts compared to Aaron, and he thinks it might bug him more if they were both playing hockey, but as it is, the level of millionaire they respectively are doesn’t come into play much, especially since Aaron’s not the kind of guy who throws his money around, at least in Toronto. Matt’s been to his place in San Diego. Huge is an understatement.

“How’s the mansion?” Matt asks.

“Mansion-y,” Aaron says. “My parents basically took over one of the guest rooms on Tuesday and refuse to leave. My ma says it’s to make sure someone’s feeding me, but she’s held three parties since then. And two of them were family ones, but the one last night I think they were the only people I knew there. I’m being used.”

Matt snorts. “Was that the call at two in the morning last night?” he asks. “Your desperate cry for help?”

“I was legitimately hiding in my room for hours,” Aaron says. “I feel like I’m ten years old again. Can’t even leave a towel on the floor in my own bathroom without being told to quit being a slob. I swear they’re going to drive me out of my own house.”

“Well, you can always take a vacation,” Matt says.

“To snowy T.O.?” Aaron says. “Where’s your next roadie?”

“Snowy Winnipeg and Minnesota,” Matt says.

“Boo,” Aaron says.

“We hit Florida next month,” Matt says.  “If you’re free.”

“I’ll make sure I am,” Aaron says. “If I don’t crack first. I swear, I’m considering buying another house and not telling anyone the address. Except maybe you. You’re okay.”

“Aw, thanks,” Matt says.

“Anyway, I gotta go, there’s this shit I’ve got to do,” Aaron says, and Matt bites back a petulant, ‘no, stay’. They haven’t been able to carve out a proper conversation in awhile. Part of that is probably the Vasquez takeover, but there’s the time difference, and Aaron’s training, and it all just works out to be just as inconvenient as when their seasons are overlapping, schedules all over the place, but worse, because they’re not in the same room for any of it.

“Talk to you soon?” Matt asks, and it comes out a little petulant too, despite himself.

“Hope so,” Aaron says.

Matt’s peering at the beer in the fridge and considering texting Trembs to see if he’s willing to go out, because his apartment feels stupid empty, when there’s a knock on his door. Trembs’ inability to call before swinging by is usually annoying, but Matt will fucking take it right now.

“You’re not Marc,” Matt says dumbly when he opens the door.

“Sorry,” Aaron says.

“I thought you had shit to do,” Matt says, still kind of — okay, definitely dumbly.

“Yeah, you may have been that shit I had to do,” Aaron says.

“That is the lamest pick-up line I have ever heard,” Matt says. “And the most insulting.”

“It’s working for you though, isn’t it?” Aaron says with a grin.

“I haven’t seen you in six weeks, of course it’s fucking working for me, get in here,” Matt says.

*

“I can’t believe you frigging Skyped me just to like, lie to build the surprise,” Matt says, muffled into Aaron’s chest.

“I didn’t lie,” Aaron says. “I said they were gonna drive me out of my house, I just didn’t mention they already had. Booked a flight right after you missed my desperate cry for help call.”

“I no longer feel guilty about sleeping through it,” Matt says. “And the next roadie stuff?”

“Well, I will make myself free for Florida,” Aaron says. “I just — that was too far off, so. Here I am.”

“Yeah,” Matt says. “Here you are.”

Aaron runs a hand through Matt’s sweaty hair, and Matt relaxes into it.

“Wait,” he says. “You definitely lied, Mr ‘Beautiful, Balmy’.”

“If you let me finish I would have said twenty,” Aaron says. “But I knew you’d be all sore about it.”

Matt snorts. “How long you in town for?”

“Until my folks get the hell out of my house?” Aaron says.

“So awhile, then?” Matt asks.

“So a little while, yeah,” Aaron says.

“Okay,” Matt says. “Good.”

“Yeah,” Aaron says, and presses a kiss to Matt’s temple like punctuation.


	47. Luke/Nikita; meaning

He didn’t believe him at the time. He believed Luke meant it, but he didn’t believe him.

There’s something hollow in him after, gnawing at him, and when Luke doesn’t touch him, even incidentally, on the ice the next game, it’s cavernous.

Luke was always so easy. Even when he was practically carving his name into Nikita’s skin, even when his fists lead to emergency surgery, the reconstruction of Nikita’s cheekbone, missing weeks, playing with a cage for months. He understood Luke. He knew Luke. Luke was easy. And Luke was easy for him.

He could tell Luke had a crush on him from the start. Some of the guys on the roster joked about it, though Nikita’s pretty sure they thought it was whatever the platonic version is supposed to be. Rookie hero worship. He wonders how Luke’s managed to keep it hidden, because he hasn’t heard even a murmur about Luke, and the league talks. Maybe there’s been no one else. Maybe Nikita’s been the only. It’s highly doubtful, but maybe.

The feeling, thinking that, it’s a complicated one.

It doesn’t matter if he was the only, anyway, if he was the past.

*

Luke leaves the conference. It doesn’t make a difference, when it comes down to it. They haven’t fought since before. There’ve been checks, given and taken, but with the anonymity of strangers brushing shoulders in the hallway, it feels like, at least on Luke’s part. Nikita always has his eye on the numbers.

Nikita misses him. Luke moving to New Jersey doesn’t change any of it, except giving him fewer chances to miss him. He wouldn’t think about it much, until a game against the Flames was coming up, and then it was all he could focus on. That was the case for pretty much the entirety of his twenties, but the difference was that then there was something to think about, something to look forward to, even though that, as often as not, was cuts and bruises as well as Luke’s body furious against his own, running hot through their pads or running hot against Nikita’s skin.

Luke goes to the Devils. The Jets play the Devils. They’re not even line-matched, and if Luke looked him in the eye even once, well. He didn’t.

*

Usually it’s when games are coming up, newly over that Nikita thinks of Luke, so the bolt of a thought on a Sunday morning, three weeks since their last meeting, two months until the next, it makes no sense. Ana’s making eggs, ignoring Maxim smearing food all over his high chair, and Nikita’s throat is so tight he can’t breathe.

Nikita can’t picture it, the sort of Sunday mornings him and Ana shared, even before Maxim, her with the newspaper, old fashioned, him looking at the news on his phone, telling her about all the things that have happened since it went to print. He can’t picture that.

There’s a part of him, that hollow point, that wants it, or at least to be able to picture it. A part that’s ravenous for it.

*

Nikita remembers Luke the way he was the night before Nikita left Red Deer, tears on his cheeks and threats on his lips, caught between Nikita’s thighs, beat down and hysterical, telling him he thought they meant something.

It’s not really something you forget.

He’d say he’d never seen anyone more beautiful, but he’s seen Luke since. Luke with blood on his face, Luke with blood in his mouth — his own, Nikita’s, both — Luke under him, over him, in him, the only one who ever has been. Luke who’s probably the only person in the world who hates Nikita more than Nikita hates himself.

Luke who loves him. Or did. It’s probably past tense by now. Though you can’t control that. Nikita knows you can’t control that.

*

Nikita meant it, when he said it. When he told him. He meant it. He knows what Luke thinks, knows Luke thinks it was an out. It might have been. It probably was. He needed one, and Luke is easy. Was easy. The easiest thing in Nikita’s life, even when he wasn’t. Especially when he wasn’t.

He meant it.


	48. Jared, Julius, cribs

It’s great from a social media standpoint when you’ve suddenly been handed a Calder favourite, but man Quinn wishes he had some charisma to back it up.

She’s not even asking for a huge amount, media personality level — try finding that on hockey teams, you have maybe a one in a hundred chance, and even then you try to get them to act and it all collapses — just enough that no one’s going to get secondhand embarrassment watching Quinn and Brett trail Halla around his apartment.

She’ll take a charismatic piece of furniture or something, a surprising hobby, anything that’ll make it more interesting than ‘this is my IKEA table, and this is my giant TV, and this is my bathroom with a bar of soap and nothing else, and this is my empty fridge’, the way it always seems to be when they do this. She doesn’t know what the Oilers even eat. How do they stay in game shape considering their collective diet of ketchup and Gatorade?

“Maybe he’ll show us a secret stamp collection,” Brett says. He’s making fun of her, but he just has to follow them around with a camera, he doesn’t have to try to draw Halla out of his shell.

“At this point I would be genuinely excited about that,” Quinn says. Any hint of a hobby other than ‘hockey, obviously’ is appreciated. She was legitimately happy when, last season, Fitzgerald opened his closet to show a truly ridiculous number of shoes and baseball hats taking up more than half his closet space.

Matheson’s the one who opens the door after they get buzzed up, and Quinn blinks.

“He forgot you were coming today,” Matheson says.

“Is he…not here?” she asks. She wasn’t aware Matheson and Halla were roommates, but it wouldn’t be that surprising, considering they are on the road.

“No, he’s here, I think he’s cleaning,” Matheson says, and steps aside so they can come in.

“You don’t have to clean for our sake,” Quinn calls out. She’d rather he didn’t, honestly. A bit of mess is humanizing, especially since she thinks most of them have their places professionally cleaned before her and Brett come by. There is no way the entire roster is as neat as they appear. She has seen the explosion of mess that is the player lounge. And the plane after a long flight. And the locker room.

“You wanna set up?” Matheson asks, and then goes and sits on the couch while Brett gets his camera out, Halla finally coming out of what’s probably his bedroom, looking slightly flustered, for him at least.

“Sorry,” Halla says. “I forgot.”

“Not a problem,” Quinn says. “Do you need more time?”

“No,” Halla says. “Is okay. Welcome?”

“You want me to head out?” Matheson says.

“No,” Halla says. “Stay?”

Matheson shrugs, but doesn’t move.

“Let’s get things rolling,” Quinn says. “Brett?”

He gives her a thumbs up. “Okay, so how about we go back into the hall and knock?” Quinn says. “And you can answer the door and welcome us inside we’ll do the tour.”

“Okay,” Halla says, and when they come back in it’s to the most monotone ‘Welcome to my apartment’ she’s ever heard, and there is a lot of competition.

He shows them his IKEA dining room table, his fridge. No ketchup, but there’s Gatorade and coconut water and a lot of takeout boxes and not much else. Quinn’s internally sighing when they get to the living room: giant TV, couch, Matheson sitting on the couch.

“So you and J Math live together?” Quinn asks.

“No?” Halla says, sounding confused.

“I live in the building,” Matheson says, and Brett swings the camera to where he’s still got his face in his phone. “Pretty convenient hang outs. Honestly you should be doing my apartment, Julius spends more time there than he does here.”

“I do not,” Halla says, scowling, and thank god, Quinn’s found her stamp collection. She will happily take a hockey bromance as a charisma bolster. Fans don’t seem sick of the Fitzgerald-Morris one yet, but it’s always great to have extra ammunition.

“Bud, where’d you eat dinner last night?” Matheson asks.

“Your apartment,” Halla says.

“And who’d you have lunch with today?” Matheson asks.

Halla gives Matheson the death stare that fans have been memeing since the preseason.

“Me,” Matheson continues. “At my apartment.”

Halla’s glare intensifies.

“And where—”

“My bedroom!” Halla says, leading them away, and Quinn hears Matheson snickering in the background as they follow him down the hall, hopes the mic caught it too.

“Idea: every time we do anything on Halla, we’re inviting Matheson,” Brett says when they leave. The bedroom and bathroom were exactly as you’d expect, but what wasn’t was Matheson following along, chirping Halla for the bathroom and bedroom being exactly as you’d expect, finally pulling a few surprisingly amusing chirps back from Halla about Matheson’s own apartment.

Quinn is in firm agreement.


	49. Oleg, David, Charlotte; etiquette

Oleg would like to think that he is not an oblivious man, and even if he were, he doubts he could be so oblivious not to be stuck by the fact he’d never met David’s parents after knowing him for years. After meeting his father he certainly understood why that was the case, at least as far as he went. But, while he knows David’s mother has an important job doing something in Canadian politics, it’s still faintly incredible to him that he’s never met her, not when they’ve played in Ottawa — and David is noticeably not going out with anyone after those games — nor when the Islanders invited their families for the final game of the season.

David doesn’t talk about either of them, and while David doesn’t talk much about his personal life in general, Oleg suspects it’s more than that, so he’s a little surprised when he finds out David’s mother is coming to visit him. 

Or, not exactly, in the end.

“It’s a business trip,” David says. “She has to come to Washington a lot.”

That makes it even more surprising that this is the first time David’s ever mentioned a visit. He supposes it could be that David just never mentions when she is in town, but the way David says it, it doesn’t sound like that, sounds like David’s just as surprised as he is.

*

Kirill calls him the next day, which is unusual. He texts frequently, a mess of emojis and tangled English and phonetic Russian that gives Oleg a headache to decipher. But calls, calls he generally saves for David.

“I heard David’s mom is coming into town,” Kirill says, and Oleg glances over at where David and Robbie are watching whatever show they’re on now, catches David looking at him, like he sensed Kirill’s presence even though the phone.

“You’ve met her?” Oleg asks Kirill in Russian. David’s been trying to get better at Russian, but while he understands the most basic words, and hockey terms, and every single dirty word Kirill could throw at him, he has trouble stringing them into sentences, even more trouble following.

“Yeah,” Kirill says.

“What’s she like?” Oleg asks.

“Polite,” Kirill says, in a tone of voice that implies  _he’s_  being polite in choosing that word.

“Well,” Oleg says. “He had to get it from somewhere.”

“He got it from somewhere,” Kirill says, his voice unusually flat.

“What are you asking from me, Volkov?” Oleg says, because he’s obviously angling for something.

“Maybe invite yourself along?” Kirill asks hopefully.

“I’m not his guard dog,” Oleg says, but if she’s anything like David’s father is, he frankly doesn’t want to leave David alone with her. If he doesn’t talk about them, see them, there’s a reason, and a good one, because David is — David is loyal. David followed Oleg to Washington, eats dinner with his family every few weeks, keeps every promise he makes with Oleg’s children, admitted he watched three seasons of something he disliked because Robbie was enjoying it. He’d see his parents, even if he didn’t want to, dutiful about it. The fact he never does says more about them than him.

“Did you want me to join you and your mother for dinner next week?” Oleg asks before the game.

“It would seem kind of weird,” David asks, but not like he’s saying no, just like he’s acknowledging it.

Oleg waits.

“If you want,” David says.

Oleg doesn’t, really, but he supposes he’s going.

*

Kirill wasn’t wrong in describing Charlotte as polite. Oleg can think of a few others. Polished, is the immediate impression he gets when she joins them at the table they reserved, on time down to the minute. Put together. Not a hair out of place.

David stands when she arrives, just as polite, and Oleg does the same.

“Oleg Kurmazov,” David says, and when he holds out his hand, she takes it, greets him in Russian. Her Russian’s better than her son’s, but he has a feeling she thinks it’s much better than it actually is, and the look on her face, like she’s expecting him to be flattered, or impressed, bothers him. Even if Oleg hadn’t already known she was in politics, he suspects he would have guessed within a minute of meeting her. There’s something about her that’s very practiced. Maybe that isn’t the word. Artificial.

He thinks of David’s knee-jerk etiquette, the way it comes out the strongest when he’s uncomfortable, off balance, and he thinks he knows exactly where it came from, and he thinks he knows exactly why Kirill’s voice was so flat when he agreed.

“You play with my son?” Charlotte asks, a genuine question, it appears. Oleg’s parents can name every single player on the Capitals roster, the Canucks roster, could recognize them by sight. They ask about David every time they call, seem to have adopted Dmitry’s road roommate as a third son. And Charlotte doesn’t seem to know who Oleg is. Nine years he’s played on a line with David, and she asks if Oleg’s on his team.

“Since he was a rookie,” Oleg says, and it comes out harsher than he intended to. “Islanders and Capitals.”

The look on her face is polite interest, or, more likely, polite disinterest.

“He is the most talented player I have ever played with,” Oleg adds, and doesn’t even care that David looks embarrassed, because it’s true.

“He’s very good,” she says agreeably. “It’s so nice of you to come by and introduce yourself. I’m glad we could finally meet.”

She’s certainly more subtle in her dismissal than her ex-husband, but it’s dismissal all the same.

“I thought—” David starts, and then looks at Oleg a little helplessly.

“David invited me to join you,” Oleg says. “I hope that is not a problem.”

“No problem at all,” Charlotte says, and it even sounds like she means it. Definitely a politician.

Oleg hates politics.

“Moscow’s very beautiful,” Charlotte says, after they’ve ordered their drinks, breaking a stilted silence. “I’ve visited many times.”

“I have never been,” Oleg says, and ignores the sharp glance David sends him. He’s not particularly interested in humoring her. “But I am sure it is.”

“St. Petersburg?” she asks. “That’s where your other Russian friend is from, right David? Also very beautiful.”

“Yeah,” David mumbles at his plate. “Kirill’s from St. Petersburg.”

“No,” Oleg says, and half expects her to run through a list of Russian cities she’s heard of in order of population. Perhaps she only knows the two, because she doesn’t. She moves into Russian cuisine instead, and Oleg feels like he’s in a Russia 101 course. It’s faintly insulting. He’s honestly waiting for her to tell him she has a collection of Matryoshka dolls next. 

He can tell it frustrates her, that he won’t play along, though it never reaches her face, and eventually she changes the subject to how nice this restaurant is, how nice Washington is also beautiful. Oleg unfortunately cannot say he’s never been there, considering the location. Yes, he’s seen the cherry blossoms. Beautiful. Very nice city. He likes living here. David likes living here. Ottawa is nice as well. He has not yet had the pleasure of skating on the canal, unfortunately, but he’s sure it’s enjoyable. And so on.

Fifteen minutes of conversation feels like a bag skate.

“You’re from right outside Moscow,” David says a little uncertainly when Charlotte excuses herself to the rest room.

Oleg shrugs. “I did not feel talking about how beautiful Moscow is all night,” he says.

“Okay,” David says, fiddling with his fork. He does that a lot when he’s flustered, finds the nearest item to play with. Oleg’s genuinely surprised his parents didn’t stop him from doing it in his early childhood. It’s not, in a word, polite. Certainly not politic.

“I am getting steak, you?” Oleg asks.

“The chicken,” David says, still fiddling.

It’s an unpleasant dinner. Not hostile, not like it was when Oleg met Jeffrey Chapman, but unpleasant nonetheless.

“Thanks for coming,” David says after. It was lovely seeing David, wonderful to meet Oleg, they must do it again when they’re in Ottawa. She gave Oleg a handshake, and David a hug that was so insubstantial the handshake might have been more contact. All very polite.

Oleg thinks of the unfriendly, critical, utterly miserable kid David was as a rookie, so desperate to prove himself, the quiet young man he was tonight, shoulders hunched, eyes on his plate, and as a parent, he wants to slap her.

“Any time,” Oleg says, and unpleasant as it was, he means it. He also doesn’t think it’s something that will be relevant any time soon. “Tatiana says she misses you.”

“I was there last week,” David says.

“Come for dinner tomorrow?” Oleg asks. “Salmon.”

“That sounds good,” David says, and when Oleg pats his shoulder, he’s strung tight with tension all the way through, but he starts to relax, just a little, when Oleg squeezes.


	50. Luke, Morrises; afterthought

Luke retires when he’s busted. Bum knee, bum shoulder, glass jaw, and even if he hadn’t been a mess of shit past rehabbing, they don’t need him anymore, no longer need the kind of job he was there to do, not if he can’t score too. Even when he was at his best, he was never much of a scorer. Hasn’t broken into double digits since the Dub. Hasn’t had his point total go into double digits since the Flames. He goes on LTIR with an MCL tear, and the season’s over and his contract’s done and no one would want him in free-agency even if he could make his body last one more year.

So he goes home. It’s what he does every summer anyway, trains with Ben, spoils the kids, has his mom spoil him like he’s one of the kids. Nothing much is going to change. He’ll just have to figure out something to do with his days. Physio, that’s what he needs now, but that’s something he’ll have to go to a proper city for, with the kind of rehab he’ll need. He’s not trying to get fighting fit again, not sure he even could, but he’d like to get rid of the knee brace eventually, and his shoulder doesn’t ever feel right anymore, always feels like the stiffness of sleeping wrong.

But he’s got a summer. They’re going to need him to heal his knee up before they start doing the hard shit, the shit that really hurts. He doesn’t know where he’s going to go, for that, but in the meantime, he goes where he does know.

The Oilers are in the playoffs, so Luke bums around Grande Prairie doing nothing much, trying to keep himself busy. Takes Holly’s kids to the mall on weekends, give her and Mark a break, watches every movie in theatres, a few twice, helps his mom get stuff made for a church bake sale, helps his dad fix up the yard as best he can, though they might need to wait for Ben to really get going, because between the two of them they have one non-shitty knee.

It doesn’t feel like the offseason, not really, not until Ben comes up, second round exit and then a few days to sulk about it before he’s coming up, Sadie running up the drive to greet him and his folks before Ben or Vicki have started to unbuckle their seatbelts, full of beans after a five hour drive.

Sadie flings herself at him first. Luke does his best to brace himself on his good leg, but the impact’s still jarring, and he can tell Ben’s aware of that by the ‘Sadie’ as he gets out of the car, as sharp as he ever gets with her. It’s not that sharp, but Luke gets that. She’s a good kid, same as her dad. The kind of person who’d only ever hurt someone without meaning to.

“Hey sweet girl,” Luke says, leaning down to hug her better. She doesn’t let go of him when Ben and Vicki come up to hug him, and mom and dad seem to give up on waiting for her to let go of Luke, so it ends up being a little pile of his favourite people in the world. The kind of thing you come home for.


	51. Robbie(/Georgie); Barony

Robbie’s getting ready to do a media thing with Chaps when he gets the call from Rutledge telling him he’s packing his bags for Cleveland. And then Robbie’s not doing a media thing for Chaps. Or packing his bags, honestly, because all he’s doing is sitting on his bed, feeling somehow numb and the opposite of numb, all at once.

Georgie’s played like shit since he went up, Robbie knows that, and they’ll probably do anything to make sure their precious prospect isn’t a washout, up to and including picking up a guy he had chemistry with in the past. That was Robbie’s fear, going into the draft, that the Barons would target him, the whole fucking reason he opted out, but you can’t opt out of a trade, especially when you don’t have any NTC to speak of.

What can he do, walk into Rutledge’s office and say ‘please don’t do this to me’? It’s already done, and even if it wasn’t, it’s a business. He doubts Rutledge would give a shit that he’s trading Robbie right into his worst nightmare.

He’s still sitting on his bed, frozen, when there’s a knock on his door, and when he opens it, Matty and Wheels are there, sporting the longest faces in the world. Robbie guesses the news got out.

“Want to help me pack?” Robbie asks, the words coming out kind of raspy, kind of wrong, and when Matty hugs him he squirms right out of it because he’s afraid he’s going to cry.

Matty and Wheels help him pack. Well. Matty packs for him, and Wheels fetches and carries for Matty. Robbie’s not doing much himself.

“This fucking sucks so hard,” Matty says, when he drives him to the airport.

Matty doesn’t know half of how fucking hard it sucks.

*

Robbie’s mamma has called three times by the time he’s through security, left three messages. Robbie wants to talk to her so badly, but he can’t, because the second he hears her voice he’s going to lose his shit, and he can’t. If he talks to her, he won’t get on that plane, and right now that sounds good, but failure to report is a career killer, and Georgie’s fucked up enough of Robbie’s life, Robbie’s not going to let Georgie fuck up his career too.

Hearst is waiting for him at Arrivals. Apparently he lives nearby, always picks up the new guys. Captainly duty. Robbie looks out the car window and tries to respond to Hearst’s questions but it’s fucking hard.

“You played with Dineen, right?” Hearst asks, like that isn’t the entire reason he got sent to this shit fucking state, to play with this shit fucking team, with his shit fucking ex.

“Sure,” Robbie says. “Yeah. Only seems to play okay when he’s playing with me.”

Hearst laughs, a little uncertainly, like he’s not sure it was actually a joke, and Robbie doesn’t give a flying fuck what he thinks it was. It’s the truth anyway. What Georgie was so fucking scared of, his rookie year, that he didn’t know how to play without Robbie anymore. Turns out he was right to fucking worry.

*

Robbie’s mom calls him three more times that night. He texts her, ‘I can’t talk about this’, and she stops after that, thank fuck, because even hearing his phone ring was getting his eyes filling. Fuck he hates this city. Fucking ground zero of the worst day of his life. Both now, he guesses.

He gets another call, Rhode Island area code, and it shuts the fuck up when he throws his phone at the wall.

*

There’s an optional practice the next morning. It’s not optional for him. He hopes Georgie doesn’t show, but that’s just delaying the inevitable, and anyway, he knows he’ll be there. Of course he will.

Maybe it’s been long enough, maybe Robbie will look at Georgie and feel fucking nothing. Not likely, considering he’s sick to his stomach just thinking about him, but maybe.

Georgie’s gotten better looking since college, if that’s even fucking possible. Robbie gets introduced to too many people to remember, though he knows a lot of the names from Georgie’s rookie year. Shakes a lot of hands. Tries to smile, though he doubts it’s happening. Georgie doesn’t approach him, during, but he comes over after, just as soon as Robbie’s gotten some breathing room.

“Hi,” Georgie says. Hi. Like nothing’s changed. Like things are fine. Hand half out like he thinks Robbie’s ever going to shake it.

“If you touch me I will punch you in the fucking balls,” Robbie hisses, and he wishes he could take pleasure in the way Georgie takes a step back, but he can’t take pleasure in anything right now.


	52. Melissa/Georgie, Robbie; intimidation

Melissa is not intimidated by Robbie Lombardi. Not by his history, not by his continued presence in Georgie’s life, not by him at all.

Except maybe that’s too simple.

She’d looked Robbie up after Georgie told her about them. Of course she had  — first thing she did when she got home. Same age as Georgie, two years of college that overlapped, then an extra one, the one Georgie had cheated on him, Capitals after. Fucking millionaire, unless he’s blown it all, but then, so’s Georgie.

He’s surprisingly average looking. Average height, brown hair and eyes, same as her — well, she’s taller than average, but not by much — pretty average face though his eyebrows are kind of impressive, like the statement brow trend on acid. It seems like the only thing impressive about him, which is surprising, considering Georgie’s gorgeous. 

Maybe he’s better looking in person. She doesn’t know. She’s not exactly the type to go stalking guy’s exes online, but then, it’s sort of stupid easy when he’s kind of a public figure, in a way. Page after page on google images. Some of them are with Georgie on the ice, and she tries not to read into them, the ones in college or the more recent ones.

She tries not to think about him, and she mostly manages, but it comes up sometimes, either with Georgie, when he’s talking about a game, mentions his name, or just in her head when Georgie’s out of town, ‘I wonder if they’re hanging out right now’. It gnaws on her a little, wondering if Georgie overstated the hating thing, thinking about the way he talked about him, regretful, like he’d fix things with them if he could.

She wanted to meet his team anyway, figured that’s a pretty important step, but she probably rushes it more than she would have, because she wants to meet Robbie. Or maybe not even meet him, but see him.

She notices Robbie when they walk in, but that’s only because she’s looking for him. In person he’s…average.  She can tell he’s got muscle, but other than that, she wouldn’t have pegged him for a hockey player at all. But then, she didn’t peg Georgie, either. Missing teeth is probably a cliche. She doesn’t get it, but then, she doesn’t get a lot of relationships. The surface stuff isn’t what matters, in her experience, at least not when you’re in it.

She feels his eyes on her half the time — probably on Georgie the other half — and it’s pretty immediately clear that, whatever Georgie says, whatever they have going isn’t even close to buried, seems more like something that just needs a flashpoint to ignite. It makes her feel off-balance, defensive. Well, more defensive, since she walked into the bar that way. 

She can’t say she didn’t expect him to find her at the bar when she gets a round for her and Georgie. In fact, she was kind of counting on it, because she’d rather deal with him away from everyone else, knows that Georgie’s already not happy about his place with his team, doesn’t want to make things worse. Hostile workplaces are fucking hell, and, reading between the lines, Robbie’s the whole reason Georgie’s in one.

He stares at the back of her head like a fucking creeper while she orders, and after she pays — the service sucks, and she doesn’t think she wants to stick around long, so no way is she starting a tab — she says, “Can I help you?”, without looking his way.

And, well, apparently she can, if that means getting warned-slash-interrogated-slash-berated in the middle of a fucking bar. He’s…well, intense would be a pretty nice word. Dramatic, if she’s being less nice, and she’s not really feeling nice, not with him standing too close to her, telling her shit Georgie’s already told her like it’s supposed to be a revelation, like he’d actively love seeing her surprise.

There’s warning someone off about toxic people, she sees that shit all the time, has done it herself, taken co-workers, regulars aside, given them a little, ‘hey, look out for this guy’. That’s basic fucking kindness. This is Robbie trying to fuck things up. She knows the type. She sees that all the time too. Georgie fucked up, he totally fucked up, but he was twenty-one years old and he’s owned it, and that’s more than Melissa can say for most people.

“Our beers are getting warm, so if you’re not about to tell me that Georgie eats children or votes Republican or something, you’re kind of wasting my time right now,” Melissa says, and takes some satisfaction in the slightly slack-jawed look on his face when she walks away, though it’s overshadowed by the tension running through her, the kind she runs off, the kind like she wants to fight someone. Not Georgie, and not Robbie either, but only because she’s pretty sure Georgie wouldn’t thank her for it, because fuck knows she could have come back harder and he’d deserve it. 

She feels relieved once she gets back to Georgie, but it isn’t until they head out, safely in an Uber, that she quits looking over her shoulder, checking to see if Robbie’s watching her again.


	53. Francis/Drake, Bryce; sugar

It’s still a little funny, to Francis, the variety of reactions he can get in the medical room. He shouldn’t have had any assumptions going into this job, knows from plenty of experience that you can’t anticipate how someone will deal with medical treatment by simply looking at them, or even by their manner at other points, but he supposes he’d watched too many hockey games, seen too many players injured and stoic, assumed they were the same way behind closed doors.

“Fucking  _fuck_ ,” Marcus says through gritted teeth, clammy and sweating, as Francis stitches up his chin. Thankfully he took the high stick right before second intermission, or he would have gotten the quick seal, been thrown right back out next shift. Francis hates watching players suffering through their shifts. The tough as nails mentality bothers him. He can’t begin to imagine how many players have made their injuries worse by refusing to attend to them immediately, but it’s the whole culture, not the individual players, that is responsible for it, so there’s not much he can do about it, other than chide them when it happens.

Marcus is handling it better than the preseason physical, at least. He went bone white over the blood tests, eyes squeezed shut and every muscle tense, despite Francis’ best efforts to get him to relax. Francis had to make him sit outside for fifteen minutes after, drink a bottle of water, nibble on a cookie, just to make sure he wasn’t going to faint.

“Should be good,” Francis says. “If it starts bleeding again in the third, don’t ask the trainers to fix it, come to the medical room.”

Usually you’d expect stitches to hold, but then, usually you don’t stride right back into a high-danger situation after getting them. Francis has unfortunately dealt with multiple cases of bad luck when a player gets an elbow or stick or a puck right to the place they had injured earlier. Drake was two of those cases.

“Okay,” Marcus says, but like he won’t. Hockey players. Francis’ most frustrating patients, bar none.

“Do you want a lollipop?” Francis asks.

Marcus glares at him. “Are you making fun of me?” he asks.

“No,” Francis says. “Drake demanded lollipops, and considering he’s in here more often than not, I figured he’d earned them. Do you want one?”

Marcus keeps scowling. “Do you have cherry,” he says, more a grumble than an actual question.

Francis goes into the drawer, finds him a red lollipop and hands it over. Marcus tucks it in his hockey pants.

“Not going to eat it?” Francis asks.

“People will say shit,” Marcus mutters.

If they said anything, it would probably be ‘where did you get that lollipop? I want one.’. Francis has had more than a few Flames come visit him lately, entirely uninjured, looking for sugar. Drake makes a habit of it; even when he’s in good form, or, unfortunately just as often, when he’s on IR, he’ll come down from the press box, dressed to the nines, and tell Francis he deserves one considering he can’t play. Francis has never denied him one; they’re running low on lemon, so he’s glad Marcus asked for cherry.

“Don’t forget it’s there,” Francis says. The last thing he needs is to be called down in the third because Marcus impaled himself with a lollipop stick.

Marcus rolls his eyes at him, looking more sixteen than a man in his early twenties.

“And come back after the game so I can check on those stitches,” Francis says.

He obeys that at least, lets Francis check his stitches — they’re fine — and Drake pops his head in just after Francis tells Marcus he’s good to go.

“We’re running out of lemon,” Francis says.

“Running out or ran out?” Drake asks.

Francis opens the drawer for him, pulls out a lemon lollipop.

“You’re the best, doc,” Drake says after he’s popped it in his mouth, and the part of Francis that tells himself he’s not going to go to the grocery store to buy replacements when they run out of lemon, Patrick Drake can just expand his horizons with orange, is beaten out by the part of himself that knows he’s lying.

Marcus is looking at Francis strangely when Drake leaves the room, lollipop in his mouth.

“Did you need something else?” Francis asks, self-conscious.

“Can I have another cherry one?” Marcus asks.

Francis bites back a grin and opens his drawer again.


	54. Luke/Andreas; checking in

Andreas checks on Luke every few months. He’s not the only ex that Andreas does it for, and at first it’s both easier and harder than with others. On the one hand, he doesn’t have a Twitter, Facebook, Instagram where he overshares everything, but on the other hand, his play is public record. So are his injuries, which hurt to read about, especially when they start stacking up. It feels like every time he checks on Luke, he’s injured again. After he retires, it’s different. No new injuries, of course. Still no oversharing, but Andreas does find an article in the Grande Prairie Daily Herald Tribune — and isn’t that a mouthful — that he’s come home.

It’s not that they haven’t talked. Andreas called him after he found out he blew out his knee, called him again when he officially retired. Luke sent a text saying ‘congrats you more than deserve it’ about a month after Dave semi-retired and Andreas, with a newly minted certification, took over some of his clients. Others, Dave offloaded on colleagues, and then, the definition of  _semi-_ retired, some he held onto. If David Chapman played through his sixties — and if anyone could, it’d be him, his play seems immune to the passage of time — Dave would probably still represent him from his deathbed. He would literally die before he handed over rights to Chapman’s representation.

The fact it was a month later had Andreas wondering if Luke had heard it through the hockey grapevine — he was one of Dave’s clients, of course, though not anymore — or if he does the same thing, has a moment, every few months, when he thinks ‘I wonder how Andreas is doing’.

And Andreas is doing good. Andreas now makes more in annual commissions than Luke made playing hockey. Andreas owns property — _owns property_  — in Manhattan, which is something he would never have dreamed of in his twenties. Andreas talks to Dave weekly, and he talks to his mother bi-weekly, and his father twice a year, and he works too hard but he’s always done that, and it mostly makes him happy.

He’s dated since Luke. He had a fairly serious relationship with a guy who worked in construction. Well, in the front office part of it; he was in construction like Andreas is in hockey. He was around a lot more than Luke was. That’s what Andreas wanted: stability. He wanted his boyfriend to actually be in the same city as him more than half the time. Of course, being around someone enough, other faults become evident. And, ironically, Quinn was the one frustrated by Andreas’ inconsistent schedule. It was one of the reasons they broke up.

It’s somewhere between Luke checks that Luke texts him to let him know he’s going to be in New York, asks if Andreas wants to catch up over dinner. Andreas says yes. Doesn’t ask why he’s in town. He wants to see him.

Luke looks good in retirement, less carved at the edges but still broad. Substantial, the way he’s always been. He pulls out Andreas’ chair for him, gentlemanly, and they swap hockey talk and retirement chat, Luke telling him how the Morrises are and Andreas telling him how Dave keeps trying to backseat agent whenever they talk.

Andreas supposes it was inevitable, them landing in bed together. He hadn’t thought about it when he agreed to dinner, honestly he hadn’t, but if anyone had point blank asked him if that was going to happen, he would have said yes without hesitation. It’s not that he’s the kind of guy who jumps into bed with his exes, because he isn’t, really, but with Luke?

It was inevitable. Or maybe it only seems that way, half-way through dinner, when Luke’s pulled out his phone to show Andreas pictures of Sadie, smiling wide at every one of them, the definition of proud. The grin’s split where they had to stitch up his mouth at some point before they got together, one that gives his smile some sort of lack of symmetry that Andreas has always found strangely attractive, and that attraction, well, it’s still very much there. Sometimes after you break up with someone you’ll take a look at them after, wonder why you were ever attracted to them at all. That’s really not the case with Luke.

“Did you want to come over?” Andreas asks after they get the bill — they both insisted on paying, settled on splitting it — and the way Luke says yes without any hesitation or surprise, he thinks maybe Luke figured it was inevitable too.

There’s a moment of awkwardness in the Uber, the short stretch of the middle seat between them, like a repudiation of what they both know is going to come. Andreas is going to offer him a drink as an excuse. Luke will say yes. He might drink it, he might not, but either way that’s not what he’s coming over for.

“Should I do the excuse of offering you a drink, or—” Andreas says, after Luke follows him inside, and Luke laughs and then kisses him, which Andreas assumes means he shouldn’t bother. Luke kisses how he always has, and it’s so easy to fall back into it, like the years have been erased.

That isn’t true of everything, though. It’s impossible not to notice when Luke’s undressed that there’s scars that weren’t there the last time Andreas saw him naked, clean lines unlike most of the scars he already had, surgically tidy, because it was surgical; the scars of shoulder surgery, knee surgery, or at least Andreas assumes, because he’s got a knee brace on, apologizes for not being able to take it off, sounding embarrassed, like it’s anything to be embarrassed about.

“At least you’re not insisting on keeping your socks on?” Andreas says.

He almost forgot how much he likes Luke’s laugh; it’s usually just a small huff of air, but sometimes it explodes out of him when he’s caught off guard, loud and bright, and he seems surprised by it. Looks surprised right now, like he forgot Andreas had a sense of humor or something.

“I would never,” Luke says.

“I know,” Andreas says. “Wouldn’t have stuck with you as long as I did if you were that kind of guy.”

“You always were particular,” Luke says.

“Still am,” Andreas says. “And are we going to reminisce, or are we going to fuck? Not that I’m opposed to reminiscing or anything, but it seems more suited to something you do in the afterglow.”

“Still bossy too,” Luke says, but he’s grinning when he says it, and neither of them talk much after that.


	55. Roman/Harry/Evan; insecurity

Most of the time, things with Harry and Connie are easier than Roman would have ever expected. Easier than things were with him and Connie, maybe because he doesn’t feel threatened by Harry anymore, maybe because for some reason the dynamic is smoothest between the three of them. Things just click: Connie smooths down Harry’s prickliness, Harry draws Connie out of his shell, Roman — well, Roman doesn’t let Harry get away with shit Connie would let him get away with, maybe that’s his contribution? He doesn’t know. They seem to like him well enough anyway.

Most of the time. Sometimes, Harry reminds Roman exactly why his rookie codename was Spoilsport.

Connie’s napping on Roman’s shoulder on the flight back to Minny when Harry passes them in the aisle, hisses “Typical,” and then goes to sit with Val. Roman blinks a few times, but has mostly forgotten it when they get back and Harry says, “You know what, you two just hang out together again,” when Roman asks if he’s coming over later.

“Um,” Roman says.

“Since apparently you’re not interested in being around me anymore,” Harry says, and stomps away before Roman can think of a response other than, ‘what the fuck?’

The fuck is that Roman and Connie have been hanging out without him a fair amount the past couple weeks. Never mind the actual reason behind that. Harry’s had a wave of Chalmers visits: Sam was in town for a game, Deb came in to watch that game then stuck around for a few days after, then, on the roadie they just got back from they hit Boston, Jersey, NYC, Hartford, and mom and pop Chalmers were there for all of them, along with Annie and Erin. Every single day Harry was off having breakfast with his parents, or going shopping with Annie, or grabbing coffee with Erin, or hanging out with a cousin or three.

Roman and Connie have been invited pretty much every time, and they’d both taken him up on it a few times — they all had dinner together the night before the Rangers game, and Connie joined Harry and Annie on that shopping trip — but that’s a lot of socialization when it isn’t your own family. Maybe it is even if it is; Roman suspects Harry’s crankiness is as much a response to too much Chalmers as it is to feeling left out. Roman figures he’ll give him the night — might be good for all of them to have a night to themselves, or, in Roman and Harry’s case, dog bonding time, and in Connie’s, Val bonding time — and he’ll be better in the morning

Except he isn’t. Connie tries to talk him down using logic, which Roman already knows is a lost cause, and Harry looks more and more mutinous as the day goes on, Connie’s peacemaker role backfiring for once. Usually Harry caves fast — he’s ridiculous sometimes, but he generally knows when he’s being ridiculous, and Connie never calls him on it, just gently nudges him back down to normalcy, or at least normal Harry.

Normal Harry is showing no interest in returning, though, just spitting mad, doesn’t want to talk to Roman or Connie Harry, which seems to be sort of self-defeating if you’re annoyed that you haven’t been spending enough time together.

Roman makes the mistake of saying that, and he can see Harry fight the urge to throw a punch. He thinks Harry almost loses the fight to resist punching when Fitzy says, “Do we need to lock you guys in a room again?”, and Fitzy must see that, because he backs down immediately, and Fitzy’s not someone who quits poking until after he gets bitten. Maybe not even then.

Val apparently tries to intercede, and Connie has to take care of his emotional wounds after. Val’s a sensitive soul.

Harry’s on day four of the most ridiculous and self-sabotaging sulk Roman’s ever seen when Roman loses patience and goes to his place. There’s no answer when he knocks, so Roman lets himself in.

“You’re not supposed to use your key like that,” Harry snaps when he comes into the hall behind Beau, who greets Roman as happily as Harry does angrily.

“You told us to let ourselves in whenever,” Roman says, giving Beau some scratches. “So I’m letting myself in. Whenever.”

Harry stomps back to the living room, Beau pulling away from Roman and following behind him, Roman following them both. Harry’s in his ‘I’m sulking and refuse to engage’ position, knees tucked up to his chest on the couch, but that’s too damn bad, because he’s had more than enough time to sulk about a problem of his own making.

“What the hell, Chalmers?” Roman says. “Are you seriously still sulking because Connie and I hung out without you? While you were busy doing other shit, I’d like to mention.”

“I’m not sulking,” Harry sulks, then, “You didn’t have to spend all your time together while I was gone.”

“What, so we could miss each other as well as missing you?” Roman asks.

“Didn’t seem to miss me,” Harry mutters.

“What did you want us to say, ‘quit hanging out with your family you don’t see enough to hang out with guys you see all the time’?” Roman says. “Come on, Harry, you wanted to hang out with your family, of course we weren’t going to get in the way.”

“Could have come,” Harry shoots back.

“We both did,” Roman says. “More than once.”

Harry’s jaw works, like he’s trying to retort, but he can’t think of anything.

“So again, what the hell?” Roman says.

Harry shrugs jerkily.

Roman sighs, sits down beside him on the couch, and Harry eyes him a little belligerently but doesn’t tell him to get up, get the hell out of his place, which sadly feels like progress. He tenses when Roman puts a tentative hand on his knee, but doesn’t knock it away, so that’s progress too.

“Talk to me, here,” Roman says.

“Didn’t seem to miss me much,” Harry mumbles again, and this time it’s less an accusation, sounds more hurt. “Barely noticed I wasn’t there.”

“How would you know?” Roman says. “You weren’t there. Plus, it’s hard not to notice when you’re not around.”

Harry narrows his eyes at him, like he’s expecting that to be a dig, and it is, a little, but one Roman means mostly affectionately. Things are a lot noisier and more dramatic when Harry’s around. And Roman did miss it.

Harry relaxes by degrees when Roman says as much — he’s the only one in this relationship who seems willing to do that without acting like his teeth are getting pulled; Connie won’t advocate for himself, and Harry, though he’ll talk and talk and talk, happy to bitch at Roman and tell Connie how perfect he is, well, this is the first he’s said about this that isn’t a hissed barb, a kid acting out for attention. Sometimes Roman’s reminded how young they both are, and even though Harry’s closer in age to Roman than Connie, he’s looking pretty young now, knees still tucked up to his chest, though he’s starting to lean into Roman.

Roman wraps an arm around him, and Harry lets him. “You cool with Connie coming over?” Roman asks. “I’ll make dinner, we’ll watch a movie?”

“Okay,” Harry says after a minute, and Roman texts him with his free hand, Connie sending back about a million smileys and arriving like he got in the car the second he got the message. No grudges from Evan Connelly, just relief things aren’t fucked anymore.

“Sorry I was a dick,” Harry says to Connie — of course to Connie, typical, but honestly it doesn’t bother Roman, and Connie needs to hear it more, even though his ‘it’s okay’ is quick and true.

“Think you can squeeze in?” Roman asks, and Connie examines the couch, looking doubtful, but makes room for himself somehow anyway.

**Author's Note:**

> [I have a tumblr for this 'verse here!](http://youcouldmakealife.tumblr.com)


End file.
